


i feel your pain too

by UnknownNumber



Category: Minecraft (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-03
Updated: 2021-01-17
Packaged: 2021-03-13 12:35:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 16
Words: 30,708
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28528575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UnknownNumber/pseuds/UnknownNumber
Summary: The concept was simple, if your soulmate got hurt, so did you. So why was this so goddamn difficult?who asked for this? absolutely nobody. who’s gonna write it? me.
Relationships: Clay | Dream/Sapnap (Video Blogging RPF)
Comments: 300
Kudos: 602





	1. lets not get ahead of ourselves

The concept was not that hard to understand, really. Everyone was born with a straight line under their right collarbone. For those who were the younger soulmate in the pair, the line would already be moving, a steady heartbeat clear to see. For the older soulmate, they were born with a straight line, giving the impression of a flatline, until the moment of birth. Until the heartbeat started moving on the elder, most parents lived in fear, knowing the possibilities were endless. There were cases of a miscarriage in Bulgaria, just for a two year old girl in Argentina to stumble, dead before she even hit the ground. There were babies born bruises from head to toe, and five year old's dying of SIDS. 

The first clear case happened with a king in the ancient times. A cook for the castle had fallen ill, a slight cold, leaving her sniffling with a headache for the day. The king had woken up to eat, already suffering the affects of the cook's sickness. Once he had found out of the other's condition, he made the conclusion of witchcraft. A beheading was ordered instantaneously. The poor cook wailed for mercy from the gods, right until the moment the axe hit her neck. The whole crowd cheered, before watching the king fall off of his throne, neck appearing almost dislocated. The coroner's had discovered his neck had been snapped, leaving him dead on the spot. 

From then as time progressed, people began to understand it better, children in schoolyards began to compare the marks on their knees, and adults started posting their conditions on the local news page, yearning for the peace in knowing what was happening to the other in the world. More often than not, these methods did not work. A rare amount of soulmates were born nearby each other, those being able to grow up as best friends, dating at a young age, and getting married at 18, having a long and happy life with each other until the very end. 

* * *

Clay had spent the entirety of his younger years not sure if he really wanted that fate for himself. He would sit in his bubble bath clawing at the moving line on his chest, trying to get rid of the future he hadn't even gotten to choose. He was called lucky when the line started moving when he was one and half, not that he remember the moment of course, but he didn't really find it too lucky. Sure there was a person on the other side of the world who would get bumps and scrapes just like him. He hadn't seen anything more severe than that; one kid falling on the blacktop outside during recess, sitting up seeing beads of blood on their freshly skinned knee. Randomly in math class across the school, a poor student suddenly clutching their knee, wide eyed and in pain. But that was the worst. He began to hate soulmates when he saw what happened to his grandma. 

It was a normal day, he had been led to bus 56 by his second grade teacher, Ms. Brown, and had sat down next to his best friend. They had chatted, until they got to the third stop, from there Clay stood up, wobbling with the slight shaking of the bus, going to the bus driver and giving him a fist bump before hopping off of the vehicle. Him and his short second grader legs ran to the door step of his grandmother's house, bursting in with a wide grin and a collection of papers clutched between his fingers. His mother sat on the couch, a book in hand and a smile on her face, while his grandmother stood with her back turned to the door, facing something that was cooking on the stove. While his mother looked over his papers, he wandered over to his grandmother. Her loose blouse exposed the end edge of his grandpa's heart beat, and he could occasionally see it if she leaned at the right angle. As she set down the spoon next to the stove, she accidently grazed the metal of the stove top. She sucked on her finger, giggling, apologizing to what appeared to be no one around. It didn't happen much longer after that, just a few moments. His grandmother's wrinkly smile and her crow's feet fell off her face, and one of pain took over. She fell to the ground, hands cradling her face as if she had placed her face on the stove top. Her eyes were wide open, tears already pouring down. His mother had rushed over, crouching over his grandmother, while pushing Clay back. All he could see was his mother's back, but he still heard his grandmother. She was screaming, piercing Clay's ears, even when he placed his paint tinted fingers in his ears he could hear it. He had begun to cry now, scared and worried. She continued wailing, an animalistic cry to the heavens that watched as she struggled. It could have taken ten minutes, or an hour before the ambulance got there. The sirens just adding to the cacophony of noises that abused his ears. His head was pounding, everything moving in slow motion, the aching of the heartbeat marked on his chest didn't help with the excess of stimulation. He fell to the ground, curling into the fetal position as the ambulance workers ran in, their loud footsteps shook the old wooden floor. They put her on the cart, making motions and saying things that Clay couldn't understand. They lifted her, and ran back out of the house, even leaving the door open in their rush. Clay just laid on the floor, whimpering like an abused puppy and shaking harder than the floor had been. He could feel his mother rubbing his shoulder, but it didn't mean anything. A tear drop fell on his hand, and he found it's source to be his mother, who was staring blankly into the home as if she could see something nobody else could. They were there for a while. Until the sirens faded, and until the headache left. Until his mother had cried all her tears, leaving her face flushed and her eyes raw. She moved Clay to the couch, placing a warm blanket out of the dryer on him. It didn't make it any better, that he could still feel the heartbeat on the right side of his chest burning. He fell asleep, thoughts racing and heart hurting. 

When he woke up, he was in the arms of his father, who was speaking in a whisper to his mother who walked beside him. They weren't home, the walls were a pure white, and the lights were much too bright for comfort. He could hear the tapping of his father's work shoes on the linoleum floor, and the shuffling of his mother's tired feet. He just nuzzled into his father's chest and allowed himself to be rocked with the motion of the walking. Eventually they stood, and a door creaked open. He was set down on the floor. He looked around at the hospital setting. A soft playing TV show, a flower in the window sill, and her grandmother, sat in the bed. He rushed over to her, smiling at the absence of wailing. He said her name, she didn't respond the first time. He called again, and when she looked, she looked straight past him. A blank gaze looked into nothingness, muted pupils rested between green irises, and at that moment Clay knew what happened. It was also at that moment that Clay decided, he would not have a soulmate, no matter what. 


	2. could you just go away?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> he went to school four different shades of purple, and he was pissed about it. couldn't his soulmate stop getting hurt for six seconds? better yet? go away in general.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is where the implied child abuse comes in!

From second grade when his grandparent's incident happened, Clay swore off soulmates. Most people tiptoed around the world, wanting to preserve the fragile body that they essentially shared. Clay didn't care. Every time he walked up to his grandparents home, the home where there was no cars in the garage, and where all the handles had ropes. Where two dogs would be sitting obediently at the door, and where there was books with no visible words inside. It just reinforced his idea that he didn't want this whole soulmate character in his life. He stopped caring about this life that he was always taught was his future. He raced around the blacktop, and if he fell, he got right back up and ran. He joined tee ball as soon as he could. He would come home from school with bumps and scrapes from head to toe.

He didn't hear or see much of his soulmate at all, in his younger years. Except for the fact that he was prone to strep. He had woken up four times in the third grade year alone with a fever of 102 degrees and unable to swallow. The strep was annoying, Clay would admit. He was a wild young boy, and it was a hinderance when not only was he getting strep all the time, his "partner" didn't seem to care in the slightest about it. He would be laying in bed for a week and a half straight, a sheen of sweat all over and a hatred for life powering him in his troubles. It only got worse with the burns and rashes. He would wake up at early hours of the morning, quivering and whimpering at his hands that burned for sometimes hours at a time. Eventually he was taken to the doctor, where he was told that it was indeed his soulmate, and the burns matched closely with chemical burns, and while he could get pain killers, there was no real way to stop it from happening other than stopping his soulmate from dunking their hands in chemicals at night around four in the morning. Those nights his lungs also burned, and a rash would develop taking over the skin of his forearms that hurt to be rubbed against. He was forced to have these rashes on full display for his entire third grade class, where he was stared at with wide eyes and a gaping mouths. Clay lived through fourth grade the same way, not caring for his health too severely, and being reprimanded in the form of painful burns and rashes with aching lungs.

It was fifth grade when it first happened. He was awake at two in the morning, stubborn tears dripping down his cheeks as he watched burns spread all over his hands that were submerged in cool water and heaved in painful breaths. Suddenly he was on the ground, his chest aching more than it ever had. He felt as if he breathed in too hard he was going to break in half. He had never felt it before, and he laid in the bathroom, wailing for help. He was rushed to the urgent care, where he was told his rib was broken clean across. With a treatment of "stay home and avoid movement" Clay was let go with anger boiling over in his soul. Usually, if he got burns on his hands, it happened every Thursday, at two on the dot. But the very next night he was the same pain. Burns appearing on his hands, this time paired with the pain of not being able to breath properly, Clay was forced to lay in bed, without the help of cool water to help. So he dealt with it. His rib eventually healed, leaving no mark but a memory of the pain, and the burns just continued, leaving him in pain every day of almost every week. 

He was in the middle of his sixth grade year when it got worse than that. He had gotten a break in his ribcage somewhere at least seven times now, and he had begun to adapt to the pain of his hands, so much that he was able to just sit in bed upset, but not much more. It was much later in the day when the bruises started appearing. Around seven or eight in the evening, while Clay sat slaving over his math homework, pain started to erupt from his ribs. He groaned and crossed his fingers, hoping that he wouldn't have to add another broken rib to his list of injuries before high school. He didn't get much time think about it, because seconds later, pain was coming from multiple places. His face was burning, and when he tried to stand up, he immediately crumpled in on himself, the pain coming from his ankle so bad that tears began to fall down his flushed cheeks. He laid twitching on the ground for hours, his mother finding him laying in the exact same place two hours later. He once again went to the doctor, where he was told he had a broken ankle and foot, and would be a cast for a month at the least. He just huffed aggressively while the kind doctor wrapped his lower leg in plaster, thinking about all he was going to say to this "soulmate" of his if god forbid they ever come near each other. Eventually he got home, equipped with crutches and a hatred for life itself, he practically crawled his way up the stairs and into the bathroom. He hadn't had the chance to look at himself since all the pain hit, but now he wished he hadn't. He realized why all the nurses were looked at him with pity. He had a sprawling bruise across his face, making him look as if he was in a fight with a bear on roids. He struggled, but eventually took his shirt off, exposing his chest to the mirror. It just got worse from there. He was marked like a spotted cow in bruises. They began as early as his collar bones and went to his hipbones, traveling down to his thighs. He would imagine that this idiot he was assigned at birth had decided the best way to spend their morning was to put themselves in the dryer on the harshest setting. 

The worst part of all it, was that this person didn't even seem to care about anything that was happening. Even when he lied in bed with his leg raised well above his head in elevation and a heating pad wrapped around his calf he was in pain. A sharp pulsing pain resonating at all points in time, as if the person was walking everywhere on the leg with no regard for what was happening. He was forced to in bed cursing the god for subjecting him to the torture of having a soulmate. 

These bruises happened constantly, starting in sixth grade, and still happening into his sophomore year of high school. He had come to grow use to the gob smacked looks of his classmates, and the constant casts wrapped around his body. Something new was added in high school, however. Hunger. Clay would wake up in the morning, eat a full breakfast, and still feel hunger pangs. It got so bad that he was unable to go to school, literally wasting away on himself despite his constant intake of food. He was subject to his apparently anorexic soulmate, and he was not very pleased about it. He would go weeks where it seemed as if the other partner in his pair would go without any food, only to eat a small amount on a random day and move on. 

He didn't care in the slightest about his person, he cared about himself. If he were to care for himself, he was going to need to track down this person, and give them a piece of his mind. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> another awful chapter served hot this morning!


	3. slow down, what?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> well, maybe this person wasn't that bad. maybe.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yo yo yo, here i am for the early birds of dreamnap

It was getting to be agony to exist by the time that the summer before junior year rolled around. He was getting hunger pangs so strong that he couldn't walk for too long, had gotten two broken ribs within the first week that he was out of school. The burns no longer appeared on just Thursday, now appearing on Sundays as well, leaving Clay unable to use his hands all of the week without the consequences of rubbing against a chemical burn. He was bedridden, starved and injured, forced to call all his friends and tell them that he could not come hang out because he was stuck at home broken every way he could be. While he had just grown used to the physical pain, it was the fact that his mental state was deteriorating that was bothering him. He was a nice looking guy, he'd admit to himself, but he couldn't even look at himself in the mirror with the bruises that more often than not covered a portion of his face. He hadn't gone outside for more than a couple minutes, leaving him craving sunlight more than ever, and his friends were slowly starting to stop messaging him at all. He laid in bed, crying not because he was in pain, but because he was upset. His life was being torn to shreds by a stranger who didn't seem to care about himself in the slightest. 

Clay had dragged himself out of his room and into the bathroom, choosing to go over his body and inspect the obvious. He had every stage bruise ranging from blue and purple to yellow and green, and he stood crooked, with the pain in his rib cage making it unable to stand straight. Burns stopped at his wrists, but rashes went all the way up to his mid-forearm, fading out at the elbow. From there bruises took over, leaving no part of his body unscathed from the attacks. For the first time since he was in second grade, he took the time to look at his soulmate mark. The line showing the heart rate of the other mocked him, screaming that he could never escape, and even if he tried, he would be murdering in the process. He stormed angrily out the bathroom as fast as he could with two broken ribs, and stumbled back onto his bed, were he positioned himself as perfectly as he could, left to stare blankly at the walls of his pastel blue room. 

Another hunger pang hit, making him entirely curl in on himself, which consequently left him letting out a guttural wail from the pain of moving his damaged rib cage too severely. His parents knew at this point what was wrong, but he could still hear the sound of his mother's hurried footsteps up the staircase. When she came into the room, Clay had already uncurled himself, going back to laying on his bed in the way he found more comfortable, with hot tears still dripping down his cheeks and onto the pillow. His mother just wandered over, leaning against his bedside table, before gently rubbing his head. He had always been a momma's boy, and the warm presence of her next to him made him relax his body, drifting off into a drowsy state. He awoke slightly when she stopped, but he was back to being calm after she turned off the light. Just for a moment, even if it was just a moment, he wasn't in pain and fell into a slumber. 

* * *

When he woke up, it was not peacefully. His rib cage was hurting more than it should if it was just suffering some broken bones. It was as his soulmate was slowly applying pressure as hard as they could to the broken rib. Clay tried his best to just move around and make the pain magically disappear but that didn't make it any better. The pain was growing too much, he was now squirming on his bed, small whimpers escaping his lips. More and more, the pressure growing until he was seeing tunnel vision, fading out of reality around him. Suddenly, the pressure was gone, and he felt as if he could breath again. It didn't take more than a minute for the pain to return. Again, pressure against his broken rib so hard that he experienced tunnel vision. But it kept going, and he let out one last groan before his eyes fell to the back of his skull and his eyelids fluttered shut, passing out from the pain. 

* * *

He woke up in the hospital this time. The pure white lights reflected off of his sweaty body, and accentuated the array of bruises and their colors. A nurse stood at the counter off to the side, her back turned to him, though he could see her shaking her head slightly. His mother sat in a chair next to the door, her face pressed into her hands, while his father stood next to her, eyes seemingly focused on the painting on the wall. He was fine for just a second, before everything came back to him, and he let out a deep groan, causing everyone in the room to look over at him. The nurse went to the machine he was attached to writing down an plethora of things before she just did a few gentle pats on his arm and exited the room. Then his parents were all over him, touching and rubbing and hurting him. His throat felt sore for some reason, and when he tried to talk, all that came out was a whimper and a mumble. His parents just kept trying their best, but they were leaving him in more agony than he was already, and he was forced to just lay there and accept it. A tear fell down his cheek, and he felt his father's smooth hands rub it away. Whispering nonsense that was supposed to make him feel better. It didn't. 

He was released from the hospital just a few hours later, being told that technically, other than his past injuries, nothing else was wrong. All scans showed that he had no brain damage, and his blood pressure had never faltered. He could feel all the stares of pity as he walked through the doors. He could feel the guilt rolling off of the doctors and nurses in waves, reinforcing the idea he had already cemented in himself. Nobody could help him but himself at this point, and it was not going to be through ignoring the issue. He was going to have to face it head on. 

* * *

When he got home, his parents helped him struggle up the stairs, leaving him after he seemed comfortable in his bed. He let himself relax for a few minutes, and prepared himself for the trek across the room over to his desk. He was hardly able to stand, and his head spun once he actually did, leaving him wobbling in place until he was better again. He stumbled over, grabbing his pencil case and practically falling towards the door. He locked it, leaning against the door for a moment, before pushing off and going back to laying on his bed. He was tired, and he was in pain, but he persevered. He tugged his shorts up, exposing his upper thigh. This was the only place that he could think of that had the least amount of bruises, and would provide a clean and blank canvas for what he was going to try. He looked through his pencil bag, pulling out the sharpest pencil he could find. He touched the tip, and was delighted at the slight pinch of pain he got. He didn't need to bleed, he just need to something that would raise his skin. 

He pressed the pencil into the skin of his thigh, making one short line, that very shortly after raised and turned a soft pink. Clay slightly cheered, and began his message. He kept stroking, leaving behind pink lines that didn't hurt more than a tickle. He finished off his message, beginning to feel the pain from holding something too long in his hands. It wasn't very impressive, really. Just a simple _H I_ written in chicken scratch. He set down the pencil, choosing to look at his phone while he patiently waited for a response. 

It couldn't have taken more than a few minutes, for his leg to start tingling, but he chose to finish off his video, not too excited for whatever message he would get back. When he looked, the lines were more red than pink, but didn't break skin. Clearly his partner had used something sharper but not with much pressure. He wasn't quite sure what he was expecting, but he supposed it was expected for the message on his thigh to look nearly the same. Just a _H I_ written out in straight lines, a slightly larger print than his own, and it was tilted, as if this person's handwriting was in italics. 

He grabbed his pencil again, and went to scrolling on his thigh again. He was gentle with it, not trying to cause himself again permanent marks. _N A M E ?_. His question mark lacked curves, making it look more like a greater than symbol with a period underneath, but he just hoping that his person would understand the message. He looked at his leg in interest, watching the lines appear appear slowly on his skin. It took a minute, as lines on human skin was not the best medium of hand writing, but eventually, he got his answer. 

_N I C H O L A S_

His brain lagged at that moment. Nicholas was a guy's name, not a girl's name. He had never even wanted a soulmate in the first place, so he had practically classified as asexual with a hatred for everyone, but now he was being presented a new issue. Clearly this person was a guy, and he was a guy. So if he did actually accept the option of having a soulmate, that would mean that he was gay. Or bisexual, at the least. He took his time writing out his message back, obviously he couldn't just erase his words easily, so every letter was important. Again, the pencil lead met his skin, and he started to write. 

_C L A Y R U O K ?_

Again, the question mark was a more imitation of an actual question mark, but the message was legible. He felt the tingling again, but he chose to look away, some part of him watching to feel as if he was texting someone for the first time. It took a considerable amount of time before it stopped, and Clay was embarrassed at how quickly he yanked his shorts upwards. Right under his own past message was a new message.

_R U D U M ?_

Clay sat in surprise for just a moment, before he came out of his shock. He actually began to chuckle softly, but stopped immediately from the pain that erupted from his chest. 

His leg began to itch again

_L A U G H ?_

He smiled at that message. For the first time he had someone who understood him. That felt what he felt, and didn't judge him for it. He went back to writing.

_U R F U N N Y_

A new line of writing started immediately after he finished, starting to get to the point to which he couldn't see it unless he painfully bent his back. He read the message as it was written.

_T Y M Y P A R E N -_

It was cut off, and Clay felt a more significant amount of pain. While he was not bleeding, he could see the tell tale signs that his skin had been broken. It was as if Nicholas' hand jerked severely and forced him to press harder with whatever tool he was using. He was a bit upset, but everyone makes mistakes. He waited and waited. Nothing at all. No more lines whatsoever. He waited for at least thirty minutes, to the point where his neck began to hurt from staring so aggressively at his thigh, but nothing appeared. Clay just turned his nose up, pretending to only himself that he was not disappointed at the way their conversation ended. 

He checked the day, and he checked the time. He began to groan half-heartedly. He texted his mother, warning her of what was going to happen and asking her for some cool cloths. When she came to the door, it rattled, rather than opening, and he remembered how he locked it earlier. He heard her footsteps walk away and return shortly after, then the door lock popped and opened up. There she stood, with a small bucket in hand, and a couple towels thrown over one arm. He wasn't happy that he had to do this, and he wasn't happy that his mother had to deal with it. She placed the bucket down, before throwing the towels over his lap, and kissing his forehead. Whenever he was younger, she would always stick around to help, but as he got older, it just got to be a new way to make his mother suffer through watching the pain of her child. She walked out of the room, a few tears evident on her face, before she closed the door behind her. 

That's when the pain started. The burns began to spread again, all over his hands, making it impossible to think about anything else. It lasted for hours into the night, finally ending at around 2 in the morning, when Nicholas seemed to have stopped what he was doing for the night, and Clay was actually able to pretend to relax without the active increasing pain on his hands. His lungs hurt, and his ribs ached, his hands were in agony, but he fell asleep, tired after the long day. 

He woke up around three hours later to a constant tingling on his thigh. He was half way asleep, but when he looked on his thigh he saw a lot of words, most shortened, and a lot missing, but it was readable.

S R Y P A R E N T M A K E C L E A N H O U S E W C H E M H A N D H U R T B A D . I S R Y G N 

Clay took a moment. Rereading the sentence over and over again. His parents make him clean the house with chemicals. That would explain the fact that it was always on a schedule, but what kind of parent would allow their child to burn their hands while cleaning. He kept thinking and thinking, and he kept ending up in a place that he couldn't escape. He felt guilt creep up on his brain, knowing that he had been yelling profanities at a person who couldn't hear them for something they couldn't control. Plus he was in pain writing the message, which hurt Clay, but not as much as the pain of wanting to know more. He was in pain, exhausted, and he was curious. He would always hate soulmates, and he would never love Nicholas, even if he was a soulmate, but still. Maybe he wasn't as bad as he thought he was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope y'all liked it.
> 
> also I am aware that you run chemical burns under water, but since Dream is not actually exposed to the chemicals, he can not remove them, all he feels is the pain and the burns. So he is able to just keep a cool cloth pressed against the burns because he is not rubbing actually chemicals into his skin. Of course kudos and comments are appreciated. I know it is a bit of a tough concept to wrap the head around, so feel free to ask any question, hopefully I can answer them. Sorry for the long note, have a good day!


	4. well, i don't need you either

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> he disappeared. so what? he didn't care in the slightest.

Clay was embarrassed to say that he started writing on his leg in reply to the message as soon as his hand allowed him to grip something for more than a couple seconds. He again sat in bed, shorts off so that he had the full canvas of his thigh to work with. He wasn't happy to have a soulmate. He wasn't happy that he felt his pain. He was happy that he had someone who understood him, however. He pressed the end of a freshly sharpened pencil into the supple skin of his thigh, watching as it turned a irritated pink and rose slightly. While his hand hurt less, he wasn't in the mood to be in agony, so he kept his message short. 

_R U FEELIN GUD NOW?_

His hand was already starting to cramp when he finished off the poor excuse for a question mark and set down the pencil. He had dug a bit too hard on the "I" and his "U" looked more like a V, but with context clues he doubted it would be that hard to understand. He heard a ding on his phone, alarming him that he received a message. He leaned over and grabbed it, setting it down so that he didn't have to hold it. It was just a message from his mother asking him what he wanted her to bring him for dinner. He gently tapped the screen, taking his time to reply, before he pressed send on the glowing screen and closed out of the phone. He returned to the pale expanse of his upper thigh. His own message was still there, but nothing seemed to have been added, so he went back to impatiently waiting. His own message began to fade at around the thirty minute mark, going back to looking like the blank canvas that he started with. He would be lying to say that he wasn't upset he didn't get a reply. He didn't want a soulmate, he never did. But at least he got someone that related to him a little bit. He huffed angrily, but chose to just turn on the TV and relax rather than continue to stress. He was not bothered at all during that time, other than the occasional pain of the burns being messed with on his hands. He counted that as a blessing. His ribs were near healed, and his hands would always be messed up, but he could deal with that. 

He laid in around an hour before he started to suffer from something else. His fingers and toes were hurting more than usual. Which was weird, because Clay could not pinpoint anything that would affect the toes and fingers first or only the toes and fingers. There was no visible change he could see, just a gradual dull pain growing steadily. It continued to get worse and worse. The pain was starting to become unbearable at this point, of course he couldn't write to Nicholas and ask what the hell as happening, so he was once again left to suffer without knowing what was causing him to suffer. Oddly enough, a while after the pain began, it started to fade out in the same slow fashion. Clay was happy that his partner was getting out of whatever situation he was in. Looking outside, the sun was close to setting, so it was just in time for him to enjoy some sleep, even it was never tons. He allowed himself to curl ever so slightly on the bed, leaving his hands exposing to the cool air of his room, before letting his eyes shut while he listened to the barely hearable sounds of the TV. 

When he woke up, oddly enough, it was naturally. He had gotten used to abruptly waking up, usually due to some sort of trauma effecting him, but now he had woken up completely peacefully. He could hardly believe it, actually. He felt the need to celebrate, doing jazz hands and jiggling his upper body, before he laid back down. He checked his phone, answered his notifications, and realized that he had completely missed dinner in the process, noticing the note on the bedside table saying that there were left overs. Nothing was happening at all, actually. His hands were even beginning to ease up on the pain from the burns. For the first time in a long time, he smiled to himself, happy that he wasn't in agony. 

Throughout the day, he noticed that slowly his rear end began to hurt. It wasn't anything special, just a very almost a sore feeling. Now Clay was left grasping at straws at what could possibly be happening, but it never got worse than that, actually, the pain when away in around an hour. Back to peacefully existing. Suddenly, his leg was tingling. No, he did not yank his shorts up so hard that he hurt his fingers, and therefore stopped the writing in process. He felt a bit of guilt nip at his soul, but the message resumed a couple minutes later, after the pain had left. It took a little more than a couple minutes, clearly Nicholas was writing a lengthy message, so Clay decided to lay back and stare at the ceiling, waiting for the tingles to stop. When they did, Clay already had his pencil ready to respond. But he was stopped by the message. 

_STOP TRYING TO CONTACT MY SON. HE DOES NOT NEED HELP. LEAVE HIM ALONE._

Clay was left in shock, so much that his pencil fell right out of his hand. Clearly someone other than Nicholas had access to his leg, and was using it to threaten him. Probably a parent, but he couldn't understand why a parent would be so upset about his son's soulmate trying to talk to him. Better yet, the message acted as if he was attempting to steal Nicholas away from them in general. This time he took a moment to take a picture of the markings, taking a moment to pay attention to how the skin was broken more than how it was when Nicholas was writing. He took the message as a warning, and backed off. Surely his partner would message him later and clarify. 

He didn't. Clay had sat and waited for hours, but nothing ever changed, so he went on his way in life. And then hours turned to days, days turned to weeks, and weeks turned into months. He was now a week into his junior year of online high school, and he had yet to receive clarification. What he did receive was a broken left ulna, three broken ribs on the right side of his chest, bruises from head to toe, now including his thighs, a bad toothache, a couple broken toes, and a concussion. All in two and a half months. He hurt all the time, and nobody understood him. The only person who possibly could understand him was currently the one getting him injured, and was apparently not able to talk at all. Clay was angry that he was getting hurt, but he may have been a little less angry should he actually have someone to talk to about it. 

Two and a half months turned to three, and all his injuries seemed to double. He had two full on casts, multiple braces, and felt as if he got run over by a train seventy-five percent of the time.

He had gone almost 17 years without communication with this person, so Clay couldn't figure out what exactly was wrong about the fact they he had no communication at all in four months. 

It was now five months, and Clay no longer held pity. He was angry at everything. The festering anger was making him go insane. He didn't want Nicholas at all. He was fine on his own.

He knew he was just lying to himself, but if Nicholas was going to ignore him, then he would ignore all feelings he had for Nicholas. He didn't need him for almost all of his life, and he wasn't going to start needing him now. No he did not think of him when the burns returned, and no he did not even blink when hunger struck worse than it ever had. Because he didn't care about him. He didn't need to. He was betting Nicholas was wondering where he was, and he didn't care. He didn't wonder what was happening to Nicholas. He didn't wonder if he was getting a little food, or if he was sleeping. Because that's what soulmates do, they care. (and Clay most definitely didn't care)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> god this chapter is AWFUL but i really needed to set up the situation for something that happens later so bear with me. I love reading comments, and kudos are pretty pog (plus you'll make my already huge ego grow bigger). Regardless of if you do either, thank you for reading!


	5. together forever, but never together

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> it hurts so much but at least you are there

It had been seven months of radio silence from Nicholas at this point, and Clay didn't care. He stopped pulling up his pants when he felt a slight tickle from his pants. He no longer kept his pencil and pencil sharpener in his bedside table. He didn't need to. Clearly, Nicholas had found something better to do other than pay attention to him, which was fine because Clay himself had many many very important things to pay attention to. Things that were not Nicholas. He felt that in some way he was suffering from trying to talk to him, though. Ever since he had tried any form of communication, he was left with a definite increase in injuries, and the severity was steadily rising with it. He had ribs fractured more than he could even count, his arm had been in a cast at least three times now, his legs weren't doing much better, and he seemed to now constantly have a sprained ankle on at least one side. The doctor said he would definitely need physical therapy, but he couldn't start it until the injuries went away. The new addition to these injuries, was the strangely shaped bruises. A good portion were now hand shapes, as if his arm had been grabbed way too hard by someone and been tugged. He could now identify himself as bedridden, left to rot in his bed as he suffered from injuries he couldn't avoid. 

He did have his parents to thank for making his pain a little more tolerable. They brought him food, and came to hang out ever so often. They had bought him special gloves so that he could shower without getting soap in his burns, and they had got him one of the best mattresses on the market, with the hope that maybe Clay could get some more sleep the moment he was out of sleep if the bed was more comfortable. He had a new door knob, now making it a door handle, so he just had to push down in order to open the door, instead of twisting. So while life was hard, Clay could admit his parents were making his life as easy as they could. Now he began to think about Nicholas. More specifically, Nicholas' parents. Clearly they were entirely too protective over their son, which was why they wouldn't let him try to talk to him. But either Nicholas was a makeup master and a genius at hiding other marks, there was no way his parents wouldn't be able to see the way that he was getting beat to death everyday. Maybe they just didn't think it was as severe as he made it seem. Or, what if Nicholas was doing it to himself? That was a stupid idea, Clay could admit that. But the only information he had received was that Nicholas was made to clean, which a lot of parents made their children do. So maybe, they just didn't have the money for gloves, and they didn't have a good way to dilute the chemicals before he used them to clean. He couldn't possibly imagine a parent intentionally hurting their child, so he crossed that off the board first thing, and then went to peers. He was sure that if Nicholas' friends were hurting him he would leave, so that left bullies. He wasn't sure what Nicholas would have done to attract bullies who literally broke bones, so he also crossed that off the list of possibilities. Maybe it was intentional? Maybe Nicholas was a wrestler, and so he was fine with being all bruised up. But with his parents he imagined that wouldn't be possible. They wouldn't let his soulmate leave a couple marks that went away write on their sons skin, so they most surely wouldn't allow someone to beat their son up in sport form. Clay shook his head, all this thinking was making his head hurt. 

He continued with how his life was, depressed and in constant pain, but alive. 

He took the time to occasionally make sure that the injuries weren't getting too much severe. Because while he did not care for Nicholas, if he died, so did Clay, and he'd rather be prepared for that as well as he could. That was the only reason, not because he cared, but because he cared about his own health. He kept trying to mash the idea that Nicholas didn't care about him, so therefor he shouldn't care about Nicholas, but he couldn't shake the idea that maybe, just maybe he did. The way that he was gentle with the writing on the leg, the way that he had questioned when Clay hurt himself laughing. Nicholas just from those two things didn't seem the type to absolutely despise someone for no reason. After all, Clay wasn't the one who was suffering through what seemed to be torture everyday, so it wasn't as if he was the one who should be condemned for the pain that happened to them every day. 

A new thing had happened to Clay. A change in personality may be a bit strong, but he did change. Namely, he had begun to look at the little mark that was left under his right collarbone. Particularly, just how fast the heart beat was, all the time. It was if Nick was living every day in a constant state of fear and anxiety. He wasn't sure why that would be, as he was most likely home most of the time, but he just accepted that to be the way it was. He checked it a few times a day, sometimes pressed his fingers to the skin to feel the slight pulsing of the mark. The heart rate was fast, and unsteady, but oddly enough, Clay enjoyed it. He began to just place a finger or two on the mark whenever they were getting injured. It helped him think he wasn't alone. He began to fall asleep, full hand pressed against his chest as if he was doing the pledge of allegiance. It was comforting in a backwards way. The person who was hurting him was helping him more than anyone ever could. 

* * *

He wasn't expecting it in the slightest. He had been laying in bed, one hand gripping his phone, and the other gently stroking his soulmate's pulsing heartbeat. Oddly enough, suddenly the heart rate started to rise exponentially. Clay began to fear that his life was about to end. He closed his eyes and waited for the inevitable doom. Suddenly, the tell tale feeling of something on his leg. Clay just sat there and stared at the ceiling, not sure if he was hallucinating. He gently peeked into his shorts, and quickly let them down again. There was definitely something happening. It could be another threatening message from the parents. But there was a bubble of hope that lasted in his chest. It took a full three minutes for the writing to stop. Before he even dared to check, he prepared himself for the worst. Then he took the leap of faith and went for it. 


	6. you are making this "hatred" thing difficult

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> no, that wasn't true. but he'd be damned if his face didn't flush and his heart didn't race.

_IM SRY 4 LEAVING I DIDNT WANT 2 BUT I GOT THREATENED IK U R IN PAIN I AM TRYIN MY BEST IT IS NEVER GOOD ENOUGH THEY PUNISH ME MORE EVERYTIME I F UP 2 MORE YEARS JUST 2 MORE I PROMISE PLS DONT LEAVE ME IK IT IS MY FAULT AND I DONT DESERVE IT BUT PLS_

His brain seemed to take in every word and melt it on the spot. He was reading and rereading every single word just for it to come dripping from his skull. All the information was packed in that short group of words, and Clay felt as if he was analyzing a government code. His hand was still laying pressed flat against his soulmate's heart beat, but at this point his heart rate was over topping Nicholas'. It was echoing in his head and was making his chest ache. His leg was tingling again. He sat in shock, for just another moment. Then he was scrambling. 

He shot from the bed, his cast thunking unceremoniously against the carpeted floor of his bedroom. He paused briefly at the shot of pain that went from ankle to knee before he was back on the move. The tingling stopped. Clay made a grab for the pencil on the desk, grabbing it at such an angle he almost turned his hand into a kabob. He made an angry grunt at the pain, and then a pained groan at the fact that the lead had shattered against his palm. His eyes traveled every square inch of his desk. His atrocious bright red pencil sharpener was nowhere to be seen. He looked multiple times, willing that it would just appear. He was beginning to panic now, forcing him to heave air into his healing ribcage. He was in an increasing amount of pain, but he kept pushing. He dropped himself to the ground, his cast hitting the floor so hard it bounced back. He ignored the pulsing pain. Tears were welling up in his eyes. He wasn't really sure why he needed to write back, he had sworn off any feelings for Nicholas. But now that he was back, even if it was just for a moment, Clay's emotions were breaking past the dam he had built in second grade. He felt as if he would fail himself if he didn't reply. His leg was tingling again. He laid on his front side, looking all around the floor for the sharpener. There it was, lodged between his laptop charger and his wall, resting there as if it did not know what it had caused. Clay took a moment to discuss with himself on how the sharpener _didn't_ know what it had done, but regardless. Clay shoved the broken pencil into the device. He twisted it quickly, watching the shavings float gently to the floor. Once he considered it sharp enough he pushed himself off the floor, in a considerable amount of pain from all of the movement. He stumbled back to his bed, in pain, with tears dripping down the huge smile that branded his face. His leg was still tingling. So he waited patiently for it to stop. He began to feel pain in his hand, and he realized it was because Nicholas was writing for such a long time. Clearly he realized this too, as the writing stopped briefly, before resuming around thirty seconds later. Finally, the tingling stopped, and he felt a sharp prick on his skin. Instantly his shorts were yanked up, exposing the pale canvas that was his thigh. The first message was already beginning to fade out, but the message from when he was reading that message remained. It was short. 

_ARE U OK?_

He was assuming that was when he fell off his bed and hurt them. He continued.

_WHAT IS HAPPENIN ? PLS CALM DOWN IDK WHAT IS WRONG PLS COME BACK WHAT IS WRONG? WHY R U BREATHIN SO HARD? PLEASE CALM DOWN I DIDNT MEAN TO MAKE U PANIC I AM SRY._

After reading that message, he took a moment to take some shallow breaths, hoping to get some more air into his system without pain. He took just a minute to calm down, knowing that their conversation was probably on a timer, ticking away and away without knowing the cost. He gripped the pencil in his hand gently, bringing it towards his right thigh. Nicholas had taken a large potion of his left thigh up. He pressed the newly sharpened end into his thigh, thinking very carefully of what he would be doing before he did it. Finally he came to his conclusion, and began to write. 

_I AM OKAY I COULDNT FIND WRITING TOOL I JUST HAVENT HEARD FROM U IN A LONG TIME I GOT_

Clay paused. He got, excited. He finished off with the word and sat to think about it. Excitement for anything soulmate was strictly prohibited in his list of things he can not do. But that is what he felt. He was genuinely excited for what was to come. His leg began to give the signs that the writing was continuing. He waited, listening to his own heart beat in his ears. It could have been a minute or an hour before he got his reply. 

_GOOD_

Clay had not one clue how to reply to that, but he didn't really have the chance to, because the writing continued.

_I HAVE TO GO_

Just reading that, Clay's heart fell right into his stomach for some odd reason. He was confusing himself with his emotions at this point. He wanted to not care at all for his guy, but the way that his heart beat was stamped on his chest made him hard to ignore. The writing continued, just for a moment. When Clay read it, he nearly had a heart attack. 

_I LOVE YOU_

In shock would have been an understatement. Love? They had talked twice for less than thirty minutes. Clay took a moment to think about that. He had to be quick, as Nick apparently had to leave soon. The concept of love had been wiped from Clay's skull when he witnessed his grandmother's incident. It had left the scars of what love truly means imprinted on his child brain and he had yet to shake them off yet. But he sat in bed, with his face flushed, and his heart beating wildly at just the three words themselves. Was it love? They have always been together. Even when it hurt, Nicholas was the only one who was consistently there. His heartbeat rested just beside his own, telling him that he was never alone. He had switched so quickly though. He felt an emotion, that was for sure. But he used to despise his soulmate, now he was considering love? He had gone from one end of the spectrum to the other end in a very short period of thinking. Clay returned to the markings. He picked up the pencil and scribed right next to the last three words. _X2_. The finished product was _I LOVE YOU_ in Nicholas' larger and tilted handwriting, with his own writing pressed right next to it, showing that it had been done twice. Nothing happened for a while, his soulmate had left, clearly doing something else at the moment. Clay was sat in his room thinking about it. The word love bounced around in his skull, leaving splatters of its remains plasters there. 

Suddenly, Clay was much too hot. His face was hot, his body was hot, his brain seemed to be frying. Everything was happening while nothing happened at all. Then, maybe out of hysteria, or out of confusion, he began to giggle. They filled his small bedroom, echoing off of his posters and his furniture, returning back to his own ears. He stopped just for a moment. He flipped so that he was facing his pillow, and let out a light scream. He couldn't even think at the moment. The imagine of his thigh laid imprinted on his soul.

It was a bad idea, he told himself. But when he pulled up the shorts and looked at the "I love you x2" . Clay decided that it may just be worth the risk. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i wrote like 3/4 of this chapter and then my laptop crashed lol i swear the first attempt was so bomb and now this second one is going to be god awful.


	7. bad to worse

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> he thought it was bad in the first place. he really did think it was bad.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i usually update by 9 in my time, but i am late today. sorry!
> 
> WARNING  
> this chapter is much more descriptive than the rest, not for the faint of heart.

It had been a few days since the Clay had the chance to communicate with Nicholas. The conversation, however, did not leave his brain one moment afterwards. It was almost addicting to think of the chicken scratch in shades of pink that covered his thigh. He had resigned himself to the idea that he did not hate Nicholas. He felt like a lovesick girl in a high school movie. Nicholas was the bad kid in class who didn't care about anyone, who ruined every single one of Clay's days, and then suddenly he showed one ounce of sympathy and Clay was head over heels in love. Well that was an over statement. He didn't every living moment thinking about Nicholas, but he had begun to have a new found appreciation for his partner, regardless of the pain that he was put through. He had thought that he had experienced around the worst it could get, whoever was attacking Nicholas. After all, he now had gotten a concussion, and had more broken than he could count on two hands. Whoever this person was must be getting bored of ruined this kid's life eventually right?

Wrong. Clay was in a hospital room, screaming in agony. They had to move him down to the room all the way down the hallway due to the fact that all of the patients could hear his pain. He could hardly breath at this rate, having fractured five ribs in the past two hours. He needed immediate surgery, but with the trauma he was going through, they found that if he went under anesthesia it could cause his heart rate to slow down and kill him in the process. Pain killers weren't going to work. But the ribs weren't even the worst part. Three fingers were broke, all facing an odd 90 degree angle from his middle knuckle. One of his arms was broken, the bone causing a bump to appear under his skin, looking like it would erupt at any moment. His head was leaking blood from somewhere, but with all the things happening, they didn't have enough hands or materials to fix everything at once without making it worse. He couldn't hear anything at this point but the harsh beating of his heart. His vision was blurry, everything seemed connected in some way in the room. He wished he would just pass out, but every time he passed out, he was always woken up five minutes later, pain doubled. His ears were ringing, making everything anyone said to him sound like indistinguishable mumbles. He could feel their fingers all over his body, rubbing his bruises and his burns, someone kept touching his soulmate's heartbeat. He tried to stop them and tell them not to do that, but he couldn't even open, all that resounded from his body being a deep groan and a twitching hand. He kept trying to tell himself that it was going to be fine, but at the very moment fine was the last thing he could ever imagine he'd be. His vision became spotty now, as he began to fade out of reality and into a more peaceful one. Of course it didn't last long, he could have been out for two minutes or two days, but regardless it felt like nothing.

When he came back he could no longer scream from the pain. All that came out was a whistle and a guttural sound. Everything hurt, everywhere, all the time. He could hear now, though. The ringing in his ears had faded out, so while it wasn't very clear, he could hear the general concept of what was happening around him. He heard typing everywhere. There was ringing coming from what sounded like a phone, and a plethora of voices all saying the same general thing. He could hear a deep voice, explaining something. Something about finding someone, other hospitals, no matter what. It didn't matter what the voice said after that, because then he was in so much extra pain. He could feel something warm on his stomach, almost like a blanket. But it was spreading, it was moving to cover every inch of himself. It felt as if an alien was crawling out of his tummy to devour all of himself. Suddenly everything was beeping. It was hurting his ears. More hands, all over. They were pressing on his stomach. Way too hard. They were cold, and they were taking away the warmth of whatever was on his stomach. They were making the pain worse. He became so cold, he just wanted to be warm now. Then the weirdest pain he had yet to experience. It started gentle. Then it all struck, it felt as if they were trying to stick a needle through his stomach and pin him to it. Over and over again. He trying to tell them that he was cold, but he couldn't move his mouth. He couldn't move anything at all. His vision was dark, and he couldn't say whether or not it was because he was closing his eyes. All he wanted was for it to stop. Even if it was just for a moment. Suddenly, a cheer from someone in the room. Then everything seemed to erupt. The noise got to be too much, but he couldn't block his ears. He was in so much pain. He just wanted to go to sleep. The last thing he heard was something along the lines of helicopter. 

He was only awake for a few moments at the most. He was still in pain, and he was still blind to everything around him. But there was an entire collection of people talking. And a new noise. Someone else screaming, it was making Clay want to scream to. It was the sound of pure horror and pain. Clay felt as if he had heard the death of someone. He hardly had time to comprehend anything before he was out of it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter wasn't even supposed to exist. i just decided (definitely not from a comment) to make a particularly angsty chapter.
> 
> yes, this chapter is supposed to be hard to follow, i promise it will be back to normal later. 
> 
> yes it is very short, the next chapter will be much longer than average. 
> 
> take a guess as to what is happening at the end of the chapter ;)
> 
> just a side note, know that my DMs are always open if you feel like you need a person who won't judge you to talk to. i've been told i have a therapist-like quality to me. 
> 
> have a great day!


	8. two more years

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> waking up is always the worst part of the day

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> whoop whoop!

When he woke up, he was oddly painless. The stark difference between the conditions of when he closed his eyes and when he opened them was mind boggling. He felt as if he was in a dream. He was heavy when he tried to move, and he seemed to be blinking in slow motion. He still recognized the hospital, but he couldn't move his head to find a window so he couldn't determine very well what time of the day that it was. He moved his lazy eyes around the room, seeing a clock on the wall, bright red numbers telling him that it was just after two in the morning. He tried to move again, but his arms were just superbly heavy. Suddenly, a door opened and he could hear two pairs of footsteps walk in. One seemed to be walking closer, while the other seemed to travel a bit to his right. They were speaking to each other in hushed tones, discussing something that Clay would need context to understand. Suddenly, he felt a hand rubbing his shoulder. He forced himself to turn his head, feeling as if it was the most difficult thing he had ever done. What he saw was a nurse, staring at him with wide eyes. The nurse seemed to recover fairly quickly, and moved to rub his head, but he could barely feel the hand that he could see. He saw the nurse look up, and start talking to the other pair of footsteps that walked in. 

"He's awake"

He could guess his nurse was talking about him, but he didn't understand why him being awake was a big issue. He felt fine honestly. Really lethargic, but he was sure after a few minutes he could get over that. The other voice spoke up, adding something to the conversation that Clay didn't really understand.

"This one is out like a light, did he get the wrong dosage?"

He watched as the nurse that was standing next to him picked up a clipboard and seemed to speed read all of the information. He slowed down at a certain portion, even taking the time to drag his fingers along the paper while he was reading. Suddenly, he grabbed a pen that was hanging in his pocket and circled something, giving Clay's shoulder a pat before traveling in the direction of the other voice. His voice came again.

"Yeah I think so-," the rest of sentence seemed to disappear. They were already whispering, but now he couldn't hear them at all. That happened for a minute or so, but some hushed tones that he couldn't distinguish before footsteps came closer. This time, it was another nurse. She gently touched his face, before clearing her throat and talking to him.

"We are going to go ahead and put you to sleep okay?" Clay wanted to argue, he felt tired, yeah, but he was positive that he didn't need rest. "I know you feel okay, but we want you to sleep so you don't accidently strain yourself bud," Clay couldn't really argue with that logic, even though he had near no memories of what happened last night, he understood that it got him in the hospital, apparently with overnight care. He forced his head to move, nodding at the nurse, even if it probably didn't look that way. She smiled at him, before messing around with a machine next to him. He heard a couple beeps, before she started to gently rub his shoulder. His eyelids became overwhelmingly heavy. He closed them, intending to open them again soon, but they seemed glued together. He could hardly feel the hand on his shoulder, and then he couldn't feel anything at all. 

* * *

The next time he opened his eyes, there was a considerable amount of things at were different. He could see some natural light leaking into the room, but it was a warm color, leaving him to think that the sun was either rising or setting. There was an assortment of muffled noises coming from what he assumed was outside his hospital room. There was lots of rhythmic beeping coming from inside the room, one coming from the machine that the nurse had messed with earlier, and another set of beeps coming from his far right. He still felt very ragdollish, and he didn't really want to waste his energy to turn to look at what the beeping was coming from. From a quick look around of what he could see, he figured there was nobody else in the room, not even his parents, even though they had always been there when he was in the hospital. He heard the beeping on the left get a bit louder, and he stared at the machine angrily, as the noise was starting to get a bit annoying now. Suddenly the door opened, and Clay could feel a blast of cold air hit the bottom of his feet. He curled his toes, trying to protect them from the onslaught of coolness. Then three pairs of footsteps came in, all coming in his direction. Then he could see who walked in. The same nurse from earlier gave him a small smile before heading over to the machine, and his mother and father. They stayed quiet, and seemed to be looking at something else in the room occasionally, but were mainly just looking at him. The nurse wrote down a few things on his clipboard before he turned and said something to his parents, and began to walk to what he assumed was the door. Then his parents were all over him, whispering things so quickly he couldn't understand them even if he tried. He just of mumbled in response, as his tongue felt too large and his mouth too small. His mother smiled with tears in her eyes and rubbed his forehead softly. His father was next, switching places with his mother to rub his head. They all just stood there for a while, the comfortable presence of his parent's making him calm enough to rest. Suddenly, the door creaked open, and he could hear someone say something. His parent's both looked over and nodded, before his father kissed his forehead and began to head out of the room. His mother rubbed his fingers on his hands that were practically asleep before she followed his father out. He assumed it was nighttime now, and that it was just that the visitor's hours were over. But then, more footsteps entered the room, heading to his right. Even when he tried to turn his head, he couldn't. So alternatively, he chose to just close his eyes and strain his ears. He heard someone writing something down, before some footsteps headed to the door. Suddenly, they stopped, and Clay heard some whispering from what sounded like a feminine voice. In return he heard the same nurse who put him to sleep reply. 

"He has just come out of anesthesia, so he is very out of it at the moment-" some more whispers in response to that, "no you don't need to worry about that. People coming out of anesthesia have incredibly distorted memories, if they have any at all. I assure you anything that you say to your son won't stick for too long." A few more mumbles, and then he could hear some footsteps heading away. 

A particularly gravely voice kicked in, seemingly speaking to nobody in particular, "well that went horribly wrong." He heard the feminine voice kick in, upset at what that person said, "The nurse said the other kid couldn't remember even if he tried, I don't understand why you are so incessant on whispering." He heard a grumble, before the other voice spoke up. 

"Fine, I just don't trust him very much" Clay couldn't understand someone who he had never met would have anything against him but he just squeezed his eyes tighter and listened some more. "Now for him-" some footsteps shuffling, "you are going to pay for this as soon we are out of here." The woman's voice turned to almost a growl now, "do you know what we had to do to convince them?" Now Clay was concerned. He didn't even know who she was talking to, but he was more concerned on who she was convincing of what. "They were going to call CPS on us, fucker, and you know how that goes." The male voice cut in again.

"You really hurt us, doing this, you know." He sounded incredibly condescending when he said that. "We could have just gone on with life if you hadn't tried to get away-" a small pause, "if you would have just taken in like a _man_ \- you wouldn't be here right now. You know how much we worry about you, and we-" The door busted in suddenly and the person stopped talking. The nurse's voice came back and seemed to explain something. He heard some feet shuffling out. Then the door closed softly. Nothing happened for a few minutes. Then a noise from his right. 

A little cough, and then a clearing of the throat. Clay now forced himself to look over to his right. There was another hospital bed, with a person facing away from him. The person looked a bit shorter than him, and he had bandages on his head, but he could see a few locks of some blondish hair poking out. He had the same hospital attire that they had on, though it hung off him in an odd way. His eyes were beginning to get heavy. He had a cast on his arm that he could see, and a bandage around his entire chest area. Lots of IV drips led to what Clay assumed as his other arm. He blinked quite hard, trying to get rid of the little fuzzies that were appearing in his eyes. It didn't really work. He just huffed and turned away from the stranger in his room, letting his body take him away from reality as he slept.

* * *

When he woke up, he was admittedly a bit sore, but it wasn't that bad, so he counted his blessings there. He was still laying in the same hospital room, but the natural light had faded, leaving the room illuminated by only a dim lamp. He felt much less lethargic now, and wanted to test his luck. He gently lifted his left arm. It was a bit difficult to keep up, but it was better than he was doing earlier. It had a black cast on it that looked quite new. He wiggled his feet, feeling an uncomfortable stretch in the back of his leg. He tried to lift his right arm, and found that it was near impossible. When he turned his head, he could have screamed. The person who was across the room from him was now sitting on a chair right next to him. He seemed to be cuddling with his right hand. 

Clay took a deep breath, recovering his composure. He gently wiggling his fingers, hoping to wake the person up. It actually worked surprisingly well, as the person instantly started to move around. It took only a minute at the most of the person just twitching before they lifted their head. There was a moment when Clay's entire world froze, his lungs freezing in their place. The person moving exposed the heart beat of his soulmate, which would have been fine, if it didn't correlate exactly with the beeping of the machine next to him. He calmed himself, before he made eye contact with them. 

A dirty green was the best way that he'd explain his eye color, a dark green with flecks of hazel all around. His cheeks appeared slightly sunken in, a shadow quite prominent under his cheek bones. His eyelashes curled slightly, framing his eyes very well. He had oddly neat eyebrows, as if he took very care of them. His hair hung a little down his forehead, before it went back to being parted towards the right. He followed his eyes downwards. He had wide shoulders clearly, but he was scrunched so severely that he appeared very small and hurt. His own heartbeat showed prominently under this person's collarbone, and he was able to see the poking of a rib in the center of his chest. Then the bandages began and he couldn't see much more. He went to his hand. The other person's hand just rested softly on top of his own. The most concerning part being the scars covering every square centimeter of it. It felt a rough feeling on his own hand, but it didn't bother him too much. He led his eyes back to meet eye contact with him. He just gaped for a moment. He closed his mouth, clearing his throat, before opening his mouth again. The person looked at him with wide eyes and hope. He swallowed one more time, before he opened his mouth a muttered out all he could think,

"Nicholas?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just so you all are emotional prepared, this is not the chapter where everything starts getting better


	9. i've got a bad feeling about this

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> i only had you for a moment, but for that moment; i was the happiest ive ever been.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> they say that when a person adds more "y"s to a hey it means they like you more. In that case scenario:
> 
> heyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

The two sat in silence for a bit, after Clay asked if the person was indeed Nicholas. To be fair, both of them were beat to near death and in a hospital, there was not much to say. Nicholas just sat still on the chair next to his bed, an occasional tear falling down his cheek, but a small smile on his lips. He seemed to be humming to himself, but Clay couldn't pinpoint what exactly he was humming. It sounded familiar, at least. Suddenly, the other boy jerked his head up, seemingly very excited about something. He opened his mouth a few times, appearing like a fish out a water for a solid minute, but with no noise coming out. Now Clay knew he wasn't incapable of speaking, because then he would also be mute, so he just waited patiently for the other to get something out. Eventually, Nicholas' shoulders caved in, and he stopped attempting to do anything. Clay felt a small bit of sadness creep into the so far neutral moment they were having, but quickly tried to shake it away. Nicholas had stopped holding his hand as soon as he had realized he was awake, but now he seemed to not know what to do with his hands. They were constantly quivering, but he still seemed to feel the need to be gripping something, as now he had his hands in a white knuckle grip on the armrest for the chair. They had been sitting in silence for at least five minutes now, the only noise breaking through being a subtle breath or a sniffle. Eventually, Clay began to feel a bit uncomfortable. If Nicholas wasn't going to start conversation, then he would. 

"So, Nichol-" however, he didn't get to talk for long before he got interrupted.

"Please don't call me that." Clay was not expecting him to talk at all, so he just sat in shock for a moment before nodding his head. His voice was not what he expected in the slightest. It sounded as if he was just about to get over a sinus infection, but it was still comforting in a backwards way. He cleared his throat gently, "please just call me Nick, or you can make a nickname, but just-" he paused for a second, as if he was thinking of how to continue, "just don't call me my full name." Clay just nodded, confused but willing to respect his wishes. They sat in silence again, Clay not willing to test the waters again, afraid he might say something wrong. He heard Nick take a deep breath in, before starting to talk again. "Look, Clay-" he could practically hear the other boy's anxiety at this point, "I just-" Suddenly the door bust open, causing both boys to snap their head to the sound. Something must have happened during that process on one of them though, because both of them grimaced at the pain the neck. In the door way stood a nurse, staring at Nick with the fire of a thousand suns. Clay looked at Nick now, and found that he was shaking severely. He hadn't felt a change in temperature, so he wasn't quite sure why he was shaking, but regardless he just turned back to the nurse. 

"Why are you out of bed?" Fear was rolling of Nick in waves at this point. The nurse was definitely an elderly woman, who stood five feet tall at the most, and Nick was acting as if she was the devil come alive. He was slowly standing up, causing both Clay and himself to wince at some pain in the foot. That made the angry look melt off the woman's face, before she rushed over to Nick's side. He seemed to veer away from her, but couldn't go anywhere with where he was located. She stood just by the boy, before pointing aggressively at Clay's bed. "Sit." Clay had never seen a person react so quickly. Instantly, Nick was on his bed, staring at the woman like a dog wanting more instruction. That is when both of them watched the nurse as she pulled Nick's bed all the way to Clay's, pressing the side together. Then both of members of the pair sat in silence, just staring at the woman. "If you really want to be next to each other you can not be sitting, you need to be laying down" from there, Nick took his time to scoot his body over to his bed, and lay himself down. The nurse seemed satisfied with that, and walked out of the room. She stopped just before she closed the door, peaking her head through, "Oh Nick-" the said boy tensed up completely at that, "your parents are visiting first today, with luck, we can discharge you in two or three days!" After she said that, the door closed and the room was back to being silent. 

Clay looked over the boy next to him, now laying with his face a little more than half a foot away. He had only been awake for a little while now, but he could feel the ugly teeth of fatigue snapping at him. Just after he was about to say something about it, his partner let out a huge yawn, a tear falling down his cheek in the process. He wanted to ask the other if he wanted to sleep, so then they could sleep together, but he was a bit worried at the reaction he would get in response. He made a small noise, instantly Nick's eyes were on him, taking in every sound that he may or may not make. Clay just sighed, he had been through just about everything this person had, and decided there was no reason to be nervous. "do you want to maybe-" Clay mentally cringed at the term 'sleep together' as that sounded odd, and 'cuddle' would make it seem way too intimate. At that very moment he blanked, just stuck staring at Nick with an open mouth. The other cocked his head like a confused dog, before he just made his own assumption on what he should do. He pulled himself closer, obviously struggling with his cast, but pushing through it, before he just rested his head on Clay's chest and settled down. Clay wasn't too sure how to feel about the weight on his chest, seeing as he was bandaged there, but he just told himself that as long as he wasn't in pain, he was okay. It actually seemed to make him more tired, as he was nearly asleep within five minutes. He wasn't exactly sure how comfortable the other was, but he just let himself fade out, accepting the circumstance he was in.

* * *

When he woke up, it was most definitely not peaceful. His partner was no longer laying on him, now sitting up on the bed, looking at a pair of people that Clay had never seen before, and the same nurse from before. Clay forced himself up, causing both of the boys to wince at the pain that occurred from him moving for the first time in a long time. He took some time to analyze the people standing in the door, one woman and one man, both a bit heavier set, the woman having some features that Clay couldn't put his finger on, while the man had an impressive beard. He could sense that Nick was uncomfortable, so he gently put his hand on the other's back, rubbing it to try and comfort him a bit. He could feel a little bit of stress come out, but not much, as when the woman started to speak he stiffened up completely. 

When she spoke, it was undeniably, fake. Her voice was way too high pitched and feminine, making her sound like an anime character that was way overdramatized. She was arguing with the nurse about something, while the man just stood back, giving Nick the stink eye. That is when Clay decided to actually listen to what was happening to make Nick so tense. 

"I promise you ma'am-"

"I just want to take my boy back home, I know how much he hates hospitals, and I'm sure he's even more stressed out being forced to share a room!"

"Ma'am it's been shown that soulmates heal faster when they are toge-"

"Please! Just get the doctor!" 

The nurse looked incredibly upset about being pushed around by the woman, but regardless left the room, presumably to go get a doctor for something. As soon as the door closed, it was like an entire façade came crumbling down. The woman's face was suddenly angry rather than concerned, and her voice changed dramatically. 

"God Nick! Do you see all that you've put us through?" The man behind her nodded dramatically, as if she had spoken the word of god. "Nicholas-" she took a step forward, "none of us like when you go into the hospital son-" another step, "and we would just really like you to come home, so we asked if we could take you home early" she placed a huge fake smile on her face. Nick began to lean into Clay like if he pressed hard enough he could just become one with him. The woman shook her head disapprovingly. This time she looked at Clay when she spoke. "You don't know him like we do, he gets into accidents like this all the time-" Clay cut her off quickly.

"I am aware" She looked a little disgruntled at the interruption but continued anyway. 

"He used to come home all the time on the verge of passing out, bruises, broken bones-" she sniffled, "the whole ordeal. But whenever we got to hospital he was ten times worse. The thing is-" she pointed an accusatory finger at Nick, "he would always come limping to us, saying he thought he broke a bone, or he that he couldn't breathe. But we figured that if we just kept him home he'd stop faking it all the time and-" she did jazz hands, "it worked!" Clay couldn't hold back the 'wtf' face from the woman. She walked to the window like a villain in a movie. "So we are sure this whole _charade_ he has going on is going to disappear as soon as we get home." She had an odd look on her face, before it fell very suddenly. "so that is why we need him discharged today, and we will take him off your hands immediately. Sound good?" Her smile was terrifying now. He shook his head in response, choosing to now wrap his arm around Nick's waist. He was about to open his mouth and defend his stranger soulmate, but he couldn't before the door opened again. 

This time the nurse came with a man right by her side, with a furrowed brow and a few wrinkles on his face. He turned immediately towards who Clay assumed were Nick's parents. "You want him to be released today?" The woman's fake voice was back, and it make Clay want to scream just to shut her up. 

"Yessir, you see-"

"He had surgery two days ago" The doctor clearly wasn't going to take shit from a woman who was trying to steal his patient. Nick's mother took a deep breath. 

"I understand sir, it's just that now he is just recovering and no longer in pain, we think it would be better if he were at home so he is less stressed." The doctor didn't look too convinced of that. 

"Well we still have to give him a mental evaluation, after all-" the doctor squinted his eyes, "he was hit by a car, correct?" The woman nodded her head emphatically. "Well, we need you two to leave to do that." 

"Why?"

"Because that is procedure ma'am" 

"Can't you just let me have my son back?" The doctor actually rolled his eyes at that suggestion.

"I might be able to give you your son if you let me give him an evaluation, with just us."

The woman took a second as if she was considering arguing with the doctor again, before she just sighed angrily and grabbed the hand of the man before walking out of the door. Now the doctor turned towards the pair, that were now pressed side to side, both staring at the door with a different expression. The doctor shook his head, clearly upset he even had to do this. "How are you feelin guys?" Both of them just looked at him with owl eyes, before they looked at each other. Nick seemed as if he was on the precipice of falling into insanity with how tense he was. 

"I guess we are just a little-" he looked at Nick, as if to ask him if it was okay if he finished, "just a little sore?"

"Was that a question?"

This time Nick answered, waving his right arm in denial, "No, no, no- we are just sore." The doctor narrowed his eyes at the pair as if he was interrogating them. "Arm is a little painful when it moves, but everything else is just sore, promise." The doctor cocked his head at them. 

"Nick are you okay with me asking you sensitive questions with Clay here?" His partner instantly nodded his head, as if he had known and trusted Clay for years. "Okay well-" the doctor paused for a moment, "Nick do you feel safe at home?" After that question, Nick seemed like a whole new person. He was attentive to every question, his voice flat and his eyes blank. It was like he was reading off of a script he had known for years. The doctor eventually stopped asking questions, shoulders slumping as if he had failed someone greatly. "Well if you really aren't in too much pain-" both boys nodded, "I can clear you both for discharge, on the idea that you will both remain bedridden for at least a week, and only do minor tasks for the next month." When Clay nodded, Nick did not. Both him and the doctor looked at him confused. 

"I just play on the football team, just a little upset that I can't play for a while." His eyes expressed no emotion at all when he said that, but his voice was clearly sorrowful. The doctor nodded, before patting both of their knees gently and leaving the room. 

"You play football?" That seemed to catch Nick way off guard. He looked at Clay as if he asked him to strip naked. Then his face changed completely, again as if he had a gun pressed to the back of his skull. 

"Yes." Clay squinted at him, but just let it go. The two sat there, before both of them seemed to realize at the same time that they were pressed so close together Nick could have practically been sitting in his lap. Both spread apart, with flushed cheeks and small coughs of embarrassment. Just a few seconds later is when Clay realized something else. "You are leaving." Nick's eyes fell.

"Yeah I suppose I am." Nick was refusing to make eye contact now. 

"Do you have a phone?" Nick shook his head aggressively. What happened next is what caused Clay's nerves to spike through the roof. He lifted his arm slowly, trying to place it on Nick' shoulder, and instantly Nick was flinching so hard he hurt their ribs in the process. They both groaned in unison, before laughing softly at the shared emotion. After they stopped laughing at the pain, Clay commented on what caused it in the first place. 

"You're skittish." He chose not to ask it as a question, as Nick seemed to get awkward around questions. Nick just nodded. 

"Panda"

Nick just looked at him like he was speaking a foreign language. 

"I want to call you Panda." Nick just furrowed his brows, but shrugged after a minute. 

"I guess that's cool?" 

"Make one for me!"

"A panda?"

"No dipshit-" Nick busted out laughing at the harsh word said endearingly, "I want a nickname"

"Oh, uh-" He took a moment of looking out the window. "Delta" Clay could have strangled him right then and there. 

"Delta?!" Nick was back to laughing, so hard that they both began to feel the strain on their ribs. "I give you a cute animal name and you gave me D in the phonetic alphabet? What's your next idea? Foxtrot?" Clay could hardly get the last word out before he was wheezing. They both sat on their beds, in the hospital, having the time of their lives. It took a solid few minutes for them to calm down, eventually they both took deep breaths and looked at each other. "Any other great ideas genius?" Nick grinned at that, but still replied. 

"Dream." He blinked at Nick, waiting for an explanation. "It cause-" he paused, "it's cause you are all I ever dreamed of." At that moment Clay wished he never asked for a nickname. His face flushed so much he could feel the heat down to his neck. He pressed his cold hand to his cheeks, trying to get rid of the reaction. Nick giggled at that reaction. "I said delta because you are change, in case you were wondering." Clay smiled at him, and he smiled back. 

"Dream is just fine, I promise." Nick grinned at that.

"Why pandas?" Honestly Clay didn't have a reason, just when he looked at Nick, he though of the cute baby pandas at the zoo that spent their time splashing in the water and play fighting with each other. 

"You're cute." Now Nick got to feel the heat rush to his cheeks. His cheeks turned a faint pink, while his ears went a bright red, making him press his hand to his face. 

They sat in the conjoined bed, giggling softly at each other. Then the door opened again, and their faces fell. The doctor stood there, looking distraught, while Nick's parents looked as if they had won the lottery. The woman spoke up, "you're coming home!" 

Nick looked a bit panicked, "right now?"

"Yessir, right now. Go ahead and say bye to your friend so we can start the drive back home." Clay glared at the woman for calling him a friend, before he realized that was what he was, but he still didn't like it. Nick looked at him with a scared gaze, before he placed his shoeless feet on the tile floor. A nurse standing at the door handed him slippers, which he put on instantly, standing back up to be at full height. Nick kept looked at him, as if he was trying to say something. 

"Bye-" Nick sniffled, "Bye Dream." He saw his mother make an ugly face at the name, but he ignored it completely. 

"Bye Pandas."

Nick's parents left the room, while Nick backed out slowly looking Clay in the eye. He saw a hand come out a grab his wrist, before he got dragged away from Clay's point of view. Clay sat in the hard hospital bed, looking at the spot Nick used to be, not really sure what to do. All he knew was that he did something wrong. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lol did you honestly think that they were just gonna run off into the sunset together?
> 
> also this has to be the worst chapter i've ever typed out, please forgive me i am god awful with dialogue.  
> secondly, i am writing this mom and i can feel the toxicity through the keys of my laptop.
> 
> also, thank you for having 100 subscriptions to this story, like really. I can't believe that many people actually want to know when I type some crap on a laptop.


	10. can we just take a break?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> woah there, repeat that again?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey mamas

While Clay was allowed to be discharged, he was urged to stay in the hospital for longer by the doctors. So he sat through three more days of constant babying and staring at walls before he was released, ready to do just about anything but just sit there. So of course his orders from the doctor included just sitting there. So as soon as he was home, he was nearly dragged upstairs by his parents and thrown in his room, with instructions to sit there. He begrudgingly followed the instructions, even though he was as bored as he could be, hoping that if he listened he may be able to function quicker. He was just hoping that Nick was listening too. 

He was not. For the three days he was in the hospital, the only amount of pain he received was soreness from the procedures. But it seemed as soon as he laid in his bed a timer had ended, and now Nick was back to trying to hurt himself. First it was the arm. At the hospital it had been explained that both their ulna and their radius had been broken clean across, and for best results of healing, they would be in a cast for six weeks at the least, and then they still were meant to avoid any large movements for months after that. In theory, if Nick's arm was in a cast, which he had seen and confirmed, nothing that bad could happen. But apparently he was wrong. The first feeling Clay would describe as jostling. As if Nick was just throwing his arm around trying to achieve something. Then there was a large amount of pressure on his hand and his upper arm, just above where the cast ended. Then a majority of the pain faded, before it got 10x worse. He was really just laying there with his arm out to his side, but all of the sudden he felt as if his arm had been torn open. He stared at the cast like it was ludicrous. It was incredibly painful, and he was left with no way to look at the injury, because it was behind a cast. What he saw next made him scream. Blood began to drip from the opening of the cast. It was just a single drop at first, traveling on his arm, peaceful almost. Then it was as if a dam broke, blood began to pour, pooling in a dark circle on his bedsheets. His hand became covered in the liquid, and he could see the white portion of his cast was beginning to appear a dark red. He could hear his parents stomping up the stairs, but he couldn't focus on that. He was more so focusing on the fact that he was bleeding profusely. He was just staring at the blood patch grow bigger, watching as it increased it influence on his cotton bedsheets, reaching towards his duvet. His parents busted in, his father gasping and his mother screaming. He heard them one of them scream ambulance, while the other gently picked him up, holding him bridal style. He didn't really care. Actually, he felt quite numb as he watched the blood followed gravity towards his hanging hand. It dripped rhythmically on the floor, saturating it as much as it could for just a small drop of blood. He knew only half a minute could have passed by now, but it was as if everything was moving in slow motion. It seemed to be gushing in time with his heart beat, and he found that quite cool. He was sat down for a moment, before there was so much pressure on his arm. He turned to try and explain that he didn't really like that, but all that came out was slurred words and a small twitch. He tried again, but the person didn't even look at his pleas. He looked at his surrounding now. The floor was tile, so when the blood gushed out, it began to pool much better than it had on his bedsheets. It spread like a leaky faucet, and he could feel it coming into his shirt. Like it was trying to come home to him. He giggled at that thought. He heard sirens. The police were coming? He didn't even need the police! He didn't need anyone at the moment. All he wanted as to sit and watch as the blood pumped. He heard a herd of footsteps. Perhaps he was meeting the same fate as Mufasa. He giggled at that too. He was getting oddly drowsy now, even though his mind was racing. He heard lots of voices, and some crying. He remained awake, just with the deep yearning for sleep to come upon him. After that all he could remember was being in the hospital, where he got his cast removed and whatever happened to his arm fixed. He remembered getting the cast back on, but still in tons of pain. He figured Nick was okay though, and that made it feel a bit better. Clay was left wondering how the hell Nick sliced his arm open playing football or cleaning, but just let it slide. They had been through much worse after all.

It had been a week after that incident when Clay heard anything from Nick. It was as they had been doing for a while, he felt some tingling on his leg, and when he went to look, he could see the faint showing of marks along his leg. 

_# ?_

That was all that was written, and it was in such bad chicken scratch that Clay took a while to even figure out that it was a pound symbol. He looked at his phone, and then looked at his leg, before quickly replying to the message. It must have been less than two seconds after he wrote the last number before his phone started ringing. It was an unknown number, but regardless Clay picked it up. He knew who it was. 

The first thing he heard was panting, most assumedly Nick panting, so he let him breathe for a bit before starting an conversation. Eventually Nick seemed to take a huge breath, and get over whatever was happening. A few sniffles, and then his voice broke in. "Hi." He sounded much different than he did in person, but he just blamed that on whatever device he was using rather than whatever was.

"Hey!" He definitely sounded more excited that Nick about this call, and he felt his cheeks heat up a little at the enthusiasm he gave out but didn't receive. A few more breaths. One more sniffle. 

"I might need your help, Clay"

His heart fell to his chest, but at the same time, he could feel some adrenaline kicking in. "Anything." He could practically hear the anxiety through the phone. 

"I need you to-" there was a noise that came through the phone, and Clay began to worry. "I need to run away."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> congrats to the people who read notes, you guys get an exclusive question from author person. I am debating making the next chapter from Sapnap's POV rather than Dream's. thoughts? opinions?
> 
> if i write another horrible chapter i am deleting this fic and pretending it never happened. 
> 
> Bonus points to anyone who can tell me what happened with the arm. 
> 
> I wrote this instead of doing my English assignment :0


	11. a different view of the world

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> he spent everyday trying to make it better for the both of them

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter is going to include actual child abuse!! please do not read if you do not think you are suited to read something like that. just know that is the primary focus of this chapter. without further ado, welcome a new pov .

His shaky hands gently returned the phone back to it's spot on the phone booth on the wall. It was cool outside, and the gentle wind blew against his belly through his thin shirt. It hung off his frame, making him seem even more attackable than he already was with his caved cheekbones and dark eye bags. He was allowed to leave the house once a week, every Friday, when he went grocery shopping. He was given 2 hours in total, to run to the store that was 3 miles round-trip, do all the shopping, and walk all of the groceries back. He had been planning to try and contact his soulmate long before the incident, but after it happened, he could hardly wait to hear his voice again. So the next time he was told to go get groceries, he sprinted, straight to the small gas station right across from the store. He had rushed to the phone booth, his one good hand quaking around so much he dropped all of his coins multiple times. He scrawled a pound symbol and a question mark on his left thigh right in front of the gas station, just hoping that nobody was watching. He had cheered out loud when he instantly got a reply, and loved every second of the conversation that they had, even if it lasted less than a few minutes. He was now standing right in front of the gas station, the florescent lights making his eyes strain and he forced his weak lungs to pull in air. He glanced at the old clock on the wall through the nasty windows. It was an analog clock, and the second hand didn't tick, but he assumed it had been around 15 minutes, and he was already behind on time. He huffed at his own failure, before pulling open the shop door, hearing the bells chime above his head. He pulled out the few dollars that he had saved through hard work from the past week and sped walked straight to the small medicine center, where he grabbed the cheapest bottle of ibuprofen he could find, and traveled to the counter. There sat a bored worker, clearly on the verge of passing out. Nick shoved the bottle on the counter, hands shaking like a madman. The worker just looked at him blankly before he just waved Nick off. Nick stared at him questioningly, wondering why this kid wasn't going to let him buy the pain killers. The person sighed, before actually talking to Nick. 

"Just take them and leave." 

Nick did not need to be told twice. He grabbed the bottle, lips stretching from the smile he was sporting. He walked quickly out of the shop, shoving the bottle into his cargo pants pocket, before he started to run towards the grocery store. He always made sure to comb his fingers through his hair, and stand tall when he walked in. It made people think that he was less vulnerable than he was. He glanced at the clock in the store, the bright led numbers telling him it was 10:20. He began to panic now. He was never early back home, and only some times just barely on time. Now he was most definitely going to be late. He didn't really want to know what happened when he was late, so he sped through the store. Grabbing all of the things he knew he needed. He never could get anything extra. His parents only gave him the exact amount of money he would need, save a few pennies. If he didn't return the exact change to his parents, they were not very happy. He could feel his heart racing, his anxiety spiking severely. By the time that he got to the checkout lane, the time on the wall read 11:30. He could practically already feel the tears welling up as the old woman slowly scanned every item. The seconds ticked by, and by the time that the woman read out the total, he was already shoving in her face. She took her sweet time counting the cash, while Nick shoved the plastic bags into the cart, feeling a few tears fall down his face. The woman returned three pennies, which he shoved in his pocket, before thanking her and running towards the sliding doors. 

He stole the shopping cart for the time that he had to pull all the groceries to the house, but always ran it back after he got to the house. He could hear the blood pounding in his ears as he walked as quickly as he could towards his parent's house. It was now extremely cool, and it was making him start to shake. He made sure to keep his fingers warm though, he didn't want his soulmate to deal with the pain of cold fingers. Nick stuffed his hand in his pocket, pulling out the bottle of pills haphazardly. He struggled to get the cap open, only having one good arm it make it difficult to do even the simple tasks. Eventually the cap fell off, dropping to the ground, which made Nick curse angrily. He shoved a most likely not healthy amount of the pills in his mouth, dry swallowing them all. The bitter taste made him cringe greatly, but he knew he would need all the help he could get when he got to the house. He stuffed the lid back on, before he started to walk even quicker back. He saw the home in the distance, and took a deep gulp of air. He liked to whisper sweet things to himself, perhaps to ignore the inevitable as he saw the outlines of two people from the lights of the home. He pushed and pushed the cart, praying to the gods that he didn't believe in for mercy. He could almost feel them flipping him off. 

He stood on the doorstep, pulling in large amounts of air, just to practically push it out instantly. He knew he was starting to panic. The clock ran at 12:07, just proving to him his own mistakes. He pulled the cart up the steps, whining from the pain of his still broken left arm being jostled. He hugged it close to his body, just hoping that it might help even slightly. He heard the door open behind him, and he instantly began to cower away. 

"Nicholas."

His teeth were on the verge of chattering at this point. "Y-yes ma'am?"

"You're late boy."

"I'm sorr-" He didn't actually get to finish before he was hit over the top of the head with what felt like the back of a hand. He groaned lightly before he actually turned to face his assaulter. His mother stood in the doorway, her cruel smile mocked his pain. She seemed to debate something briefly, before she just started barking orders at him. 

"Put those up, and clean the kitchen, family is coming over tomorrow. I want breakfast out by five-" she grabbed his jaw, "you hear?" 

Nick nodded his head as well as he could, stuck in the clutches of her clawed hands. 

"I don't want to see you for a moment. If I see any part of your body in this home-" she dragged her finger across her throat, imitating the sight of getting her throat cut. Nick just nodded again, his jaw beginning to ache because of the pressure. She finally released him, before sauntering off and up the stairs, stopping for just a moment. "make sure you beat some sense into the fucker." He heard his father mumble something in agreement from the right, before she stomped up the last part of the stairs. Nick turned to his father, making sure that he wasn't making eye contact. When he make eye contact it made him much more upset, Nick had learned. 

"You hurt us a lot when you do things like this Nicholas." Nick sniffled slightly. "You know how much we worry when you turn up late." Nick gave a small mhm in response. "You know what I have to do." Tears began to fall down his cheeks. He knew what he 'had' to do. But he didn't feel he really needed to. More like he just wanted to see Nick in pain but convince him it was just as bad for him.

He saw the paddle before it actually hit him. It was made of premium hardwood, his mother had explained years ago. "The best in the market" she had said with an evil glint in her eye and a stupid grin on her face. It smacked aggressively against his face. He never got a warning, and it never was any softer. It was always full power swings at various parts of his body. He made sure he made no noise. That seemed to make his father hit him more. Nick cried. He didn't cry for himself, though. He cried for his poor soulmate who never deserved any of this. It hurt so bad, and Nick was just pretending it didn't. It went on and on. He glanced at the clock midway through. It had been ten minutes now. It only took a few more minutes before his father had a sheen of sweat on his forehead and seemed to decide he had done enough. He smacked the paddle on the table and stumbled up the stairs, most likely drunk. Nick waited a few moments, before he rushed to start putting up the groceries. Without a left arm in use, it was significantly harder than usual, and made his usual process last much longer than it had to. He could feel the seconds of his time to rest tick down all too quickly. As soon as the last bag was shoved in the pantry, Nick was off. 

He ran down the stairs and into the backyard, where he ran the short distance to the small shed in the far back corner. He opened the creaky door, already shivering from being outside. He wasn't allowed to have a room heater, unfortunately, and paid for that in the form of poor sleep. He triple checked his small clock's alarm was set, before he quickly rested his body on the cold floor. He tried to ignore everything around him, even though it was near impossible. As he shut his eyes, he thought of his soulmate's green eyes and gorgeous face to make him happier. 

* * *

He woke up four hours later at the sound of his alarm. He instantly hopped up and ran towards the home. He only had an hour to prepare all of the food, and clean the kitchen since he chose to just put the groceries up and go to sleep. He was quiet as he stepped into the house, knowing what happened last time he was too loud. Sneaking over to the cleaning closet, he grabbed all the necessary ingredients to make the best solution to clean everything. He grimaced at all of the bottles. He knew what they did when mixed, and he wasn't allowed to wear gloves at all when cleaning. As he poured the first liquid in, he weakly coughed at the offensive odor, before he just put the lid on and took a moment. He then moved on to the next one. He held his breath as it glugged its way into the small bucket. The next thing he put in there smelled better, but sure didn't make it easier to breath. He was always choking by the time that he got done with the cleaning, so he always tried to get it done as quick as he could. He also tried his best to avoid burning himself so that he could help preserve the fragile relationship between him and his poor soulmate. He started in the far corner of the kitchen, with a clean rag and a frown, before he got down on his hands and knees and scrubbed every tile to perfection in the kitchen and dining room. It certainly wasn't a small area, that was for sure. But he pushed and pushed through the agonizing pain and the soreness in his chest until every tile was sparkling and white. He poured the remaining liquid down the drain in the bathroom, thinking about how the pipes were probably on the verge of erosion. Luckily for him, it had only taken him twenty minutes, and left him with plenty of time to make the food and escape before something worse happened to him. His hands were severely shaking as he grabbed all the utensils and ingredients, and it only got worse when he dropped the bowl. Of course he caught it, but it left him whimpering from the pain that got ten times worse from the action of doing that. He worked himself to the bone, making all the food as perfectly as he could, and setting it out on the table. When he glanced at the clock, it was already 4:55. He yelped at the sight and ran out of the kitchen, straight out the door and back to his shed. He stared out the window, thinking about the warm food he had just made. He personally hadn't gotten to eat since he left the hospital, and the thought of it made him salivate. He knew that he was starving most of the time, but he wasn't allowed to have food, even at school. He had taken to eating a few cotton balls every few days, even though he knew it was dangerous. He did it so that his soulmate didn't have to deal with the hunger at least. He always ate them in moderation, and drank tons of water after, hoping to negate at least some of the effects. He sat on the ground of his shed, thinking about the day. He was meant to start walking to the school in about an hour, but he had a much different plan in mind. He grabbed a reuseable bag he had gotten from a friend, and began to pack. He obsessively checked out the window, even when he saw them sitting at the table as if nothing was wrong. He ignored the pain of his empty stomach, and instead focused on filling his bag off all of his meager possessions he owned. Two shirts, three pants, and a couple pairs of socks and underwear. He had no coat, and all his shoes had so many holes they were basically useless. He checked out the window one more time before he got what he really needed. He stretched as far as his malnourished body would allow him, reaching to a shelf at the very top of the shed. As soon as he felt cloth, he grabbed and yanked. And down it came. His bag of cash that he had been saving for years at this point. Based on his calculations, he should have a little more than 500 dollars in there, and he was not going to lose it. He shoved it in the bottom of the bag, covering it with his clothes, before looking around his shed again. He grabbed his pencil case, and a small torn up blanket that he had in the corner, before he shoved his bag in a corner and waited to "go to school."

He sat and watched out the window. His parents stuffed themselves full on the food he had made, and threw away the extras, leaving him no way to succeed in eating actual food. Suddenly his father stood straight up. Even though they were a long ways apart, he fell backwards, already terrified. He was already storming out of the door, Nick could tell. He began to scramble around his room, making sure everything was hidden well. He was stuck in a little box with no way to escape but the door that his father was currently walking to. He didn't really get too long to think about an escape though, as his father was at the door. 

"Nicholas!" 

Nick swallowed hard, staring at the now open doorway with his father's shadow outside. Nick stepped carefully out the door, already quivering from fear. His father looked mad, real mad. He was just hoping he had his legs at the end at the very least. He got a hard slap across the cheek, which left his cheek pulsing and hot. He just sniffled at the pain and continued to look at the ground. 

"Are you trying to kill us you fuckin bitch?"

Nick shook his head, but he didn't even get to ask what was wrong before he was shoved to the ground, scraping all of his vulnerable skin on the gravel. His father stood over him now, with something in his hand. 

"Do you know what you did?!"

Nick truly didn't, but again he didn't get to comment before his father leaned down and grabbed his still broken arm. He had wrapped it up in as much as he could find to at least try to keep it still, but now he was sure it didn't help at all to help heal it. His father grabbed his limp arm by just below the elbow and the wrist, before staring Nick in the eyes. He yanked hard, really hard. Too hard. He heard a pop, and suddenly he wailing. He wasn't even sure what happened, he just knew what happened hurt, and it hurt bad. His father dropped him again, leaning over to grab him by the head and slam it back into the ground. 

"Get up."

Nick was hardly there at this point. When he tried to stand, he was incredibly dizzy and fell face first into the ground. He heard some sadistic laughter coming from his mother. He hadn't even seen her come out though. His father grabbed him by the back of his shirt, slamming him up against the shed wall. Nick leaned against it. Left arm dangling uselessly to the ground. Then his father repeated his process. One hand wrapped around his thin wrist and the other just below his elbow. 

"You're worth nothing, Nicholas."

Nick nodded with his eyes full of tears. 

"Don't ever think that you are."

Nick just sniffled.

Then his father lifted his knee to the center of Nick's arm, and snapped his already broken arm over his knee. He couldn't say exactly what was the worst part about it. The pain was horrific, that was for sure. But he was good with pain, but the sight of his bones sticking through his pale skin scared him. And the noise. It was a crunch, a crack, and overall, just painful. He was just staring at his broke limb, now hanging freely from his shoulder that he couldn't move either. He looked at his father, to which all he got in return was a sneer. He fell to the ground, scraping himself again. He was getting nauseous from the pain. He was holding in from throwing up though. He knew he would either dry heave or just throw up water. He didn't get a choice on whether or not he didn't throw up, though, because his father slammed his foot into Nick's stomach. Instantly he was convulsing, and all of the water he had drank in the past day came straight out of his mouth. He got kicked a few more times, each time more water coming out until all he did was spasm and lay still. He saw his mother walking away from the scene. He looked up at his father. He was just standing there. The last thing he did was press one foot on his already broken son's ribcage. Applying more and more pressure. He could hardly breathe, until he heard the tell tale sound of another rib breaking. His father instantly removed his foot, looking disgusted at the fact that his work shoe had touched the boy, and walked away. 

As Nick laid on the ground in enormous pain, hardly breathing and on the verge of falling into the darkness, the only thing he could think of was that he wished he had never been born. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry i've been getting these out later in the day :( school started so i'm busy most of the day
> 
> i know i say it all the time, but i really need to learn how to write better. i can explain emotions and feelings but god forbid i have to do a setting or a situation. please, writing gods, send your blessing. 
> 
> i'm sure all of yall that wanted sapnap's pov are really happy now, right? yall enjoyed it, right?


	12. please be kidding

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> child neglect, it a strong idea, don't you think?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just so you all are aware, this work is meant to have 15 chapters sooooooo. i have three chapters to make or ruin some people's days. enjoy the 12th!

It was way too uncomfortable in this room. He felt the want to just _escape_. He wasn't even sure why he was here, though. A kind-looking woman sat behind a desk, looking over a packet of some sort. She occasionally glanced at him and smiled, but other than that she had yet to make an sort of contact. There was crayon pictures on the wall; flowers, dragons, a frog, a princess, just child-like things. The window was wide open, allowing a cool breeze to blow in. He would usually appreciate a breeze, but wearing a hospital gown made it difficult to enjoy. There were a few shelves, all having a collection of large books. They all seemed centered on psychiatry or therapy, so Clay just assumed that is what this woman was. A psychiatrist or a therapist. He returned his attention to said woman when she cleared her throat. 

"Do you know why you are here, Clay?" Her voice was very smooth, and Clay felt as if she could have voiced an A.I. system if she wanted to.

He just shook his head in return. He was just told to follow her into her room while she discussed some things with him. She made a humming noise, as if she had been expecting that response. 

"Are you feeling better?"

He took a moment to genuinely evaluate his body. He was aching all over, but overall it was slightly better than when it had started, so he nodded in response. She cleared her throat a bit before she continued. 

"Do you know your soulmate, Nichol-"

"He doesn't like being called that."

"I'm sorry about that. Do you know your soulmate?"

Know would be a bit strong. He had been attached to him since he was a year and a half old through pain. So in that sense, they were siblings at this point. But he had contacted Nick less than ten times, and it was never really full conversations. He had only met him once, but it was for a short period and they were both in the hospital. He realized the woman was waiting for a response, "I wouldn't say I know him very well, I guess."

She was instantaneous with her response, "but you do know him?" Clay nodded gently. She seemed to take moment to think. "Do you know anything about his life, particularly his home life?"

Clay racked through every memory he ever had with his partner. "Uh football" he paused after that, struggling to think of anything. The woman began to look a bit disappointed but snapped her head up when Clay started to talk again. "He has to clean the house with chemicals a lot." He couldn't remember anything that he had specifically been told, so he just went off the pain he felt. "He is hungry a lot of the time, but that went away when we were in the hospital." He just shrugged his shoulders and went to staring out the window. He could hear her pen scraping against what he assumed was a piece of paper for a few seconds, before she followed up on his claims. 

"Chemicals, you say?"

He nodded at her, not really willing to elaborate on something he was not confident on. 

"Do you know which ones?"

He just took a look at his hands, before displaying them to the doctor. The burns were beginning to fade a bit, but the skin was still red and inflamed. He just shrugged again. "Whatever does that." More pen on paper. 

"And he is hungry often?"

"He is hungry now." Clay took a moment to consider his next words carefully. "But I'd say he's hungry 65% of the time, starving 20% of the time, just fine 15% of the time." He could see her nodding out of the corner of his eye. 

"Can you tell me what it was like growing up with him as your soulmate?"

He laughed at that, then quickly shut his mouth. He cleared his throat. "I had at least one broken rib every month since fifth grade, sometimes more. More broken arms than I could possibly remember, and the burns of course." She nodded again, as if she understood. She opened her mouth to talk, but he interrupted her. "Bruises all over too, from head to toe." He giggled at that for some reason. "I had to start getting homeschooled because it looked like I was beat to a pulp everyday." Another small giggle pushed it's way past his lips. He apologized and diverted his attention to one of the drawings.

The room was silent for a long time, just the sound of his own slightly labored breathing and her writing. "Clay," he looked at her. "We-" she waved her arm around the room as if there was a group of people there, "have reason to believe that Nick must be immediately removed from his home." His surprise must have been obvious on his face, because then she started to elaborate. "We spoke to the doctor that cared for both of you last time, and he said he had suspicions that some stuff was happening behind the scenes, but-" she looked up at the ceiling as if it was going to tell her something. "but Child Protective Services had already visited the home and spoke the parents, clearing them to continue having custody of him." He took a deep breath, then stared at her asking for more. She took the hint well and continued. "It's just, we looked through both of your hospital records. You have been nearly hundreds of time throughout your life, but-" she swallowed as if she was struggling to comprehend something, "but he has been less than 10, in his entire life." 

He interrupted her spiel briefly, "I know for sure that we have had a broken arm at least ten times, even it was just a small fracture they always wanted me to have a cast. How did he get away with a broken bone and no cast?" 

She just shook her head, as if she was disappointed, "We don't know Clay, we really don't know." She suddenly straightened her back, looking very happy about something despite the previous conversation. "Luckily, with what you gave us-" she smiled, "we now have enough evidence of at the very least physical abuse to take him away from his parents."

Clay wasn't so sure if he really liked the idea of being the one to pin Nick's removal from his home, especially if they turned out to be wrong, but he gave a small smile regardless. 

The woman stood up now, motioning him to the door, "Now, we just need to figure out where to put him." 

* * *

He was laying on the cold hard ground of the shed. It had been multiple days since he had actually gotten into the altercation with his parents, so he was stuck just broken and in pain. In his favor, he was usually left alone after he was hurt for at least a week. That at least one thing he had to look forward to. He just had his hand resting on his soulmate's soft heart beat. It had always been much slower than this, and it made him a bit less anxious if he could feel it. It was a bit quick at the moment, but it wasn't getting any quicker, so Nick just prayed that he was okay. His throat whistled from his chest as he took in shallow breaths. Even sniffling made the pain significantly worse. Luckily, he had found a position to where if he just laid still, it was just an ache, which was significantly easier to tolerate than the agony before. It was somewhat peaceful, though. All he heard was the nature outside, an occasional car outside, and a few kids playing. He used to get angry at the cars. The way they drove by a dying boy, not stopping. But he knew that they didn't even know, and it was pointless to get upset. 

Then suddenly, police sirens, and a plethora of other cars. He tried to sit up to stand, but instantly the pain was so bad he fell back down to the ground. The sirens grew close, mocking the cries he made when he was in pain. But they kept getting closer and closer, until they were in front of the house. He waited for the sirens to start heading away, after passing by, but they actually stopped completely. He heard a few more cars after that, and the distant sound of an ambulance, but he continued to just lie still. 

He heard doors slamming, and some rough beating on a door, before he pretty much couldn't hear anything. Suddenly he heard the back door open, and he heard his mom's fake voice loud and clear. 

"He's at school at the moment sir, I promi-"

"We checked the school- Nicholas!"

All he was able to do was groan. He could hardly breathe let alone speak. The voices grew closer. 

"Sir, that's just tools in there I can swear on it!" 

Suddenly the door bust open, and light shone directly in Nick's eyes. He just whimpered. A police officer stood in the doorway, and his mother stood next to him frantically waving her hands. 

The police officer looked very angry for a moment. "That is a child, not a tool." His mom just had the audacity to look hurt by that accusation. "Somebody come get her and take her away." 

Now his mother seemed to be panicking, as a few police officers walked up to her roughly put hand cuffs on her. She was screaming for something, but Nick wasn't really listening, he was watching the original police officer. He walked into the shed, turned up his nose at the smell, before making contact with Nick. 

"We are here to help you bud." Nick nodded as well as he could. "You are going to be safe." 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> alright, let's take a vote (because I love audience participation!)
> 
> Where does Nick go after being recovered?  
> A. Into the Foster Care System  
> B. Moves in with Clay and his family  
> C. Moves in with other family members.
> 
> Choose well, and choose quickly!
> 
> alrighty, that chapter was a lot of dialogue, and I hate dialogue, because dialogue hates me. I hope you all liked reading it :D


	13. a new life

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> it was weird and unknown. but it was the unknown that he would jump into with his eyes wide open.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you all chose b, so Nick will be staying with Clay's family. now i have another question. I was considering extending this fic a little bit, in order to include just a chapter or two of fluff. does that sound cool? or would it be a better fic with just straight up angst? reader's choice really, seeing as i can write fluff, and it wouldn't bother me to add an extra thousand words to the fic.

Clay had yet to hear any news from the doctor who admitted Nick's situation to him. He had just been led back to his hospital room and told that he help a lot. He spent the rest of the week in the hospital being cared for by the nurses, before he was allowed to be discharged. He profusely thanked all the doctors and nurses, before practically skipping with his family out to the car. 

The silence was almost choking. They just kept exchanging small glances with each other, and then looking at Clay before repeating it all over again. He was growing annoyed with the obvious avoidance, though. 

"What are you guys hiding from me?"

They both froze like a deer in headlights. They looked at each other again, as if they were communicating words through their eyes, before his father turned to actually face him. He looked at the ceiling of the car for a second, before he seemed to decide what he wanted to say. "Did you hear what the situation was with Nichol-"

"Nick"

His father paused very briefly, but didn't look upset. "Did you hear what his parents were doing?" Clay just nodded tentatively. "Well-" he turned to look at his mom. "Do we tell him right now? What if it doesn't work out correctly?" Clay was now growing upset from not being involved with whatever was happening. He tapped his fathers shoulder, before pointing at himself. His father looked a little cautious, but regardless continued with what he was saying. "Well the police have custody of him at the moment, and they are debating sending him live with us." Clay's eyes grew wide. He was near positive that wasn't traditional. His father continued, "but the issue is, we are struggling winning the battle of custody over him." He shook his head as if he was disappointed. "His mother's sister is convinced that she'll take better care of him than us, and so the court is trying to see if that can be proved." Clay was still stuck on the idea that Nick might be coming to live with them to listen to the rest of what his father said. 

"He's going to live with us?!"

"Well we aren't really sur-"

But he was already too far gone at that point. "We will need a whole new dresser, and clothes, and we need to figure out his favor-"

"Clay." He just looked at his dad, upset he had been interrupted. "We aren't winning the battle at the moment." Clay could feel his heart shatter, all the fragments falling to his feet. Suddenly the car sped up, and he looked out the window. He hadn't even noticed they weren't going home. His mother began to merge onto the interstate, hands clenched around the steering wheel. His father stopped his thoughts in the middle though, "the doctors are all saying that we have taken care of you very well, and that you two being-" he clapped his hands together, "in proximity would be much better for his healing" he hesitated for a moment, "but the law says that when a child must be removed from his or her home, immediate family comes first, and then into the foster care system they go if immediate family can't do that." There was a bump in the road that caused his father to stop talking for a second, he grumbled about it under his breath before starting up again. "but it is not _unknown_ for a child to skip immediate family and the foster care system, if-" he stuck a finger up, "there has been contact between the soulmates prior, _and_ if it can be proven that the soulmate's guardians are more competent than the immediate family." Clay was beginning to pick up hope again. "but, the aunt is arguing that when you two met, it was under a dire circumstance, and it is not enough to be considered contact, since there was no other choice than for you two to meet up." His father rolled his eyes dramatically. "It has already been proven that we are more competent, but the court needs to completely analyze the argument that she is making before they can for sure say that he can be under our custody." That is when his mother directed the car to the exit ramp off the interstate. One of his father's signature grins grew on his face. He looked out the window at the signs, noticing a blue one with an airplane on it. "Luckily, he is coming to visit." 

* * *

Nick sat on a plane, his foot tapping faster than a jack rabbit. A police officer sat next to him, staring out the window absentmindedly. He suddenly sat up at the sound of the speakers coming on. It was not a loud speaker or anything, but it was the words that made him most excited. The steward was explaining landing protocols. That means they were about to land. He was just about to jump out of his seat at this point, and as soon as she announced they could, Nick was on his feet. He was on his feet grabbing his bag from below his seat, and practically pulling the police officer from his seat. He was ready to burst the seems, knowing what was coming. He was instantly off the ramp to the plane, looking around like a madman. The big wall to his right was decorated with a painting of a huge sun and a couple oranges, and there were people just sitting and waiting impatiently for their cue to come onto the plane. He could hear the officer chuckling behind him, before he felt his hand on his shoulder. He looked back at the man, with huge eyes and a confused gaze. The officer gently pulled Nick's bag off his back, before pointing 75 degrees to his left.

And there he was. Standing there with a curious look on his face, his parents just behind him. He looked kind of bored, but he was still attentively looking around. 

That is when it happened. He ran, and Clay turned to him. He grinned, and he opened his arms. Then they were together. Nick could already feel the happy tears falling. He could see his soulmate's mom recording them. He started to sniffle. He was so happy, and honestly, there was only one thing he could think of saying. So he said it, over and over and over again.

"Thank you"

Clay just pulled him close shoving his nose in Nick's hair. 

"Anything for you."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> obviously, most people preferred for Nick to go live with Clay, but for those who wanted the other options, this is what would have happened. 
> 
> A (Foster Care System) : Nick is sent to live with a foster family known to take good care of "troubled children", but the parents are very against the idea of soulmates. Nick joins the family, and is no longer abused or neglected, but he is not allowed any contact with Clay. Clay tries to contact him, but after hearing no response, takes the silence as abandonment after Clay had helped him about of his situation and feels used. After that, Clay goes back to ignoring the existence of Nick, and when Nick is finally able to reach out, he is rejected. 
> 
> C (Other Family Members) : The only viable member of Nick's family is his mother's twin sister who lives in Greece. His aunt is very kind, but she looks so much like his mother that he suffers from PTSD a good portion of the time, causing him to go into extreme mental distress. While Clay is allowed to call, he is not allowed to visit, and vice versa for Nick. After a few months, Nick's aunt grows tired of dealing with his struggles and sends him to the Foster Care System until he turns 18, where he lives out the scenario of A. 
> 
> and worst chapter award goes to, drum roll please! chapter 13! thank you for coming show! bye.


	14. warm winters in florida

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> if this was what it was like to be happy, he had never felt it before

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i felt chapter 13 was awful so i am back for redemption. two chapters in one day pog?

After their long hug, the soulmates pulled apart, eyes shining with unshed tears. It had not been that long since they had last seen each other, but still just the sight of Clay made Nick's heart go insane. He most likely looked like an idiot, standing there with a lopsided grin on his face, but he honestly couldn't care less. A bit a fear crept into his mind when he remembered that it may only be for the next few days, but he shook his head and decided not to think about it. Even if it was just for the next 24 hours, Nick would make it the best 24 hours of his life, without a doubt. He must have shown his emotions pretty clearly, because Clay's face morphed to one of confusion. Nick just wrapped his arms around his soulmate again and shoved his face into the other's collarbones. Suddenly he felt a cool hand on his shoulder, he looked up, and found himself looking Clay's father in the eyes.

He chuckled softly, rubbing the back of his head. "I don't mean to interrupt anything at all, buuuuuut we do need to at least move out of the middle of the walkway." That was when Nick finally took the time to analyze his surroundings, and noticed a large group of people just staring at them as if they all grown multiple heads. Nick could feel his face heating up from embarrassment, but he still had a gigantic smile on his face. His partner let out a full on wheeze at the fact that he was blushing, before leading him to the side. Clay's father followed them, looking very awkward. "Hey guys, we are going to go get some coffee from the airport café, we'll be back in a bit." He didn't even wait for a response, just giving some finger guns and walking backwards straight into Clay's mother, who turned around looked as if she was already prepared to reprimand her husband. Nick giggled when he saw her muss up his hair, and even started laughing when Clay's father in return sucked on his finger and shoved it right into his wife's ear. Now she looked out for blood. Nick could see mock fear in his eyes as he began to speed walk in the direction of what Nick guessed was the café. His wife followed, stomping obnoxiously loud, and the police officer followed after with a smile on his face. 

He turned his attention back to Clay once the three were out of sight. His partner shook his head before he began to talk. "They are always like that-" he waved his hands around "absolutely insane!" That made a few more chuckles bubble out of Nick's throat before he calmed down completely. "Are you parents like that?" Clay seemed to realize his mistake as soon as the words came out of his mouth. "I'm sorry you don't have to answer that, I am so sorr-" Nick just pressed a finger to his soulmate's lips, silencing him immediately. 

"You're fine, I promise" he instantly saw the stress leave Clay's eyes. "but to answer your question, I don't really remember too much about their relationship actually" he took the time to see if he could recall anything, "They both had the same personality, like your parents, though. They both were easy to anger and very aggressive people, and both sooooooo materialistic. They got along well together, I guess they just-" he paused, "I guess they just weren't a big fan of kids." He was lying and he knew it. His parents loved his little cousins that came and played in their yard while Nick was stuck inside. He could remember the way that they pulled out the freshly planted flowers and his mother had just laughed and sent his cousin on her merry way. His father could soothe any crying child that was put in his arms, within a minute. The real reason wasn't because they weren't a big fan of kids, it was because they weren't a big fan of _him_. He shook his head like an etch-a-sketch, as if physically moving his head would cause the memories to fall from his skull. "I wish they had moments like that though, it would have been fun to watch at least."

A sad smile graced Clay's lips, and he pulled Nick into his chest again. His chest vibrated softly while spoke, causing Nick to smile as the fabrics of his shirt touched his face. "I promise you'll get tired of it after one car ride, they are ridiculous." Nick chuckled softly to that, and proceeded to shove his face further into Clay's chest as if he was trying to dig himself inside. He could feel the other's hand stroking his back rhythmically, and he actually got a bit tired from the motion. 

Suddenly, there was a yelp and Nick saw Clay's mother nearly sprinting towards them, a drink in one hand and a packet of something in the other. Clay's father came barreling around the corner, fury visible from even where Nick and Clay were standing. Nick looked at Clay questioningly, but Clay just shrugged in response, before returning his eyes to the commotion. His mother was growing near, and Nick could see a huge smile plastered from cheek to cheek. She began to yell at them, clearly trying to explain something. All Nick heard was "salt" and "coffee" but Clay seemed to understand completely. Suddenly, Clay's hand was wrapped around his wrist, and he was pulling Nick urgently towards the exit of the airport. Nick followed cautiously at first, but caught the look in Clay's eye and began to run after him. 

They ended up running through the entire airport, bursting through the doors, out into the open where it was near empty, hiding behind a pillar. Very shortly after they came out, Clay's mother came out looking frazzled, clearly searching for a hiding place, but it wasn't much longer before his father came running out, jumping on the back of his wife. They just started giggling at each other, before Clay's mother began to complain. "You're so fat!"

His father just gave a smug look and replied very confidently, "not fat enough to hurt! Now bring me to my carriage peasant!" 

"No!" 

"It's what you get for putting salt in my coffee!"

"Oh blah blah blah it's not worth a piggy back ride!"

"Onwards!"

Clay's mother seemed to give up the fight, before she began to scan the area for her son. It was clear when she noticed the pair, because she gave a beckoning hand, and then pointed into the parking lot. She then pulled her husband's legs closer to her sides and huffed as she began to heave all of his weight to what Nick assumed as the car. Clay's father looked like a cat that got the cream and rode his wife like a knight going into battle. Nick finally turned to Clay with a confused look on his face. 

Clay just shook his head, and began to walk in the same direction that his parents had traveled in, stopping once he realized Nick wasn't following. 

"Nick?"

Nick looked up at his partner, but didn't actually respond. He could feel heat traveling up his cheeks and he hadn't even said anything yet. Clay just quirked an eyebrow at him. 

"Can I ride on your back?" He blurted it out so fast he didn't even understand himself very well. Clay just walked closer to Nick, leaning in as if he was listening better now. Nick cleared his throat softly. "Could I ride on your back? Like your dad rode on you-"

Clay laughed so loud it made Nick wonder if he had messed something up. Clay crouched down slightly, making him around Nick's height. He then just patted his own back and waited for Nick to hop on. Nick smiled greatly, and did just that. When Clay rose to his full height, it surprised Nick, so he clung on tighter. He could feel Clay laugh, before he began to move. The cool air blew on his face, throwing his hair up, and making him feel very bird like, oddly enough. They traveled fairly quickly to the car, making Nick slightly wish it were further away. He loved the feeling. He was already missing it as he slid off Clay's back. 

Clay's parents were hanging around the car, looking at each other with the after effect of the feud, but he could still see the love shining through. They unlocked the door, and hopped in, seemingly forgetting about the scenario completely. Suddenly, Nick remembered what he was missing. 

"Where is Officer Wilde? He had my stuff."

Clay's mother looked back like she expected that. "He took it to the hotel you'll be staying at with him, he said you can hang out with us for time being while he got some stuff sorted out" she grimaced as her husband poked her aggressively, "you can just tell us when you are ready and we will drive you back." At the current moment Nick felt as if he would never be tired again, but he nodded out of respect. 

He finally settled down in the car, not used to the plush seats against his back. Clay suddenly poked him. "Did you like the ride?" Nick gave a huge smile in return.

"I've never ridden on someone's back before, so it was a whole new world for me." Out of nowhere the whole car sounded like a choir. All the others started repeating "a whole new world" in a singsong voice, two of them looking at him as if they wanted him to join in. He just looked at Clay perplexed. 

His partner cocked his head like a stupefied dog. "Aladdin?" 

"Who is that?" That just made the car explode, and Clay looked as he wanted to boot Nick out the car. 

His mother yelled as if she had been injured. "We are watching Aladdin!" Nick sat there with wide eyes a pounding heart. He heard Clay chuckle at his mother, before putting his arm around Nick and not responding. 

The rest of the ride went smoothly, just a few jabs between the parents a few sniffles from Nick himself. When the car finally settled, Nick got out to look at his partner's family's home. It was smaller than his parent's home, admittedly, but this house held a completely different ambience in his opinion. It felt, warm almost. He smiled at the idea. He felt like he was at home. 

* * *

It had been around thirty minutes since he had arrived at Clay's house, and he was currently resting his head on Clay's shoulder, occasionally popping a piece of popcorn in his mouth and savoring the flavor. Clay was shoveling popcorn in his mouth like there was no tomorrow, leaving multiple pieces to fall down his chest and into his lap. The parents were asleep cuddled on the couch off to the side, the mother snoring louder than he would imagine a woman of that size could. The movie Aladdin played quietly, and the light of the TV screen illuminated the room in a soft blue. The sun was setting outside, and only a few shadows were originating from the large glass back door. 

"Hey" Nick instantly focused his attention to his soulmate when he whispered that. "Come with me" then he just stood up, watching as pieces of his snack fell to the carpet. Nick stood up after him, checking to make sure the sleeping pair were still asleep. 

Clay wandered to the back door, slowly opening it and allowing a cool breeze to blow against his exposed face. He grimaced slightly, before he watched his barefoot soulmate walk outside onto the patio. He pressed his uncovered feet against the concrete, feeling the rough surface against his soft feet making him feel very _real_ for a moment, before he followed his partner. He was sitting on a little swing bench with striped yellow cushions, patting the space next to him. 

Nick sat down as he was expected, resuming to lay his head on Clay's shoulder. His soulmate wrapped his arm around his shoulders, pulling him a bit closer and looking at the sky. There were a few stars out, and they reminded Nick of the cake that he had to make for his little cousins birthday. Dusted in glitter with an occasional bright spot against the navy blue and black backdrop. A cool breeze ran through his hair, but the warm air outside made it practically useless. 

"I used to hate you, you know?" Nick heart froze for a moment, not really expecting that, but he answered regardless. 

"Used to?" 

"Yeah, used to." His partner turned to make eye contact, "I spent so long, just wishing that you never existed, so that I could stop being attached to you-" he sighed softly, "I regret ever feeling that way now. Mainly because- you just are worth every single injury that I ever endured already, and I hardly know you." Nick just smiled gently. His partner leaned in a bit closer. "I don't want to say I've forgotten or anything like that, but I do want to say that I am sorry for ever thinking you weren't worth the trouble." They were very close now, breaths mixing together at this point. His partner took a deep breath, and closed the space between them, pulling back fairly quickly. Nick opened his mouth to speak, but he was interrupted. "You don't need to say anything, just yet. Just- know that I would have gone through all of it a billion times again if it meant I could see you smile." His partner proceeded to stand up and walk back to the backdoor, not turning back around.

Nick sat there, on the soft cushions, with the breeze blowing against him, and the stars twinkling in the sky, and knew that he would forever find winters in Florida to be the best time and place for him. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is the fluff. i hope you enjoyed reading it as much as i enjoyed writing it. (god it is so cliché) 
> 
> i was thinking about writing a mafia au, but i have yet to see one under the dreamnap tag and i am a too much of a wussy to be the first.


	15. waiting for the call

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the people in the court often don't know what is happening outside

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is filler chapter, so you won't miss much if you wait until the finale.

As he sat on the swing, feeling the temperature drop as the last inkling of sunlight fell below the horizon, he felt as if this is what life was meant to be like. Watching the meager leaves flutter on the trees, and seeing the lights of the homes around shut off, he was in amazement. He had been sure that the life he had before was the only life he could have. Of bruises and broken bones, with no outlook for tomorrow but the expectation of fear. It had only been a week since that all vanished, and here he was staring at the open sky blind to the future, but already happier. He glanced around the backyard again. It was the first place that he could say that he was happy. He would remember every blade of grass and every single weed breaking through the cracks in the concrete. He was beginning to grow cold now, but he wasn't ready to leave. He didn't want to leave this serenity that he had to himself. He turned his head sharply when he saw a flash of light. There was nothing there though, just the empty expanse of the picket fence. Then again, a small light, bright for just a moment before it vanished, as if it was never there at all. He stood from the swing, wincing at the cool concrete underneath his bare feet. He took one step at a time, halting once he met the edge of the patio. The light was moving around, but not too far. He pressed his toes onto the dewy grass and moved forward. Closer to the blinking dot. He grew near, and looked around. Suddenly, just a foot from him he saw the light again. He reached out his hand, and waited patiently for the bling to come back, and as soon as it did, he grabbed as quickly as he could. He definitely caught something, it was moving around on his palm. He changed his grip to where he was cradling the thing with two hands, before he opened a small gap in his hands. Inside was a bug of some sort, not really moving, seeming resigned to it's fate. But it wasn't lighting up, so Nick looked up again, searching for the source of the light. Suddenly, his hand started to glow through the small gaps between his fingers. He gasped, nearly dropping his new friend to the ground. He opened his fingers like a lotus, allowing the bug to be exposed to the night air. It crawled on his hands for a moment, before it lit once more time, spreading it's wings and flying off into the breeze. He watched as it faded out of his vision, the small source of light floating into the oblivion of the night. He let out a sniffle, and a shiver went down his spine. He slowly traveled back to the patio, stopping just before the back door. He took one last look at his surroundings, smiling at all that had happened within the last 15 minutes. He opened the sliding door, allowing the warm air from inside to remove the goosebumps from his skin. 

As he came in, he slid the door closed as quietly as he could, as he could still see the figure of the sleeping adults on the couch. He glanced around, looking for Clay, but couldn't actually find him in the room. He proceeded forward, but stopped when he heard footsteps. He held his breath, waiting for more noise, before he noticed it was coming from upstairs. He remembered seeing the stairs when he first went into the home but didn't even take the time to consider how that meant they have an upstairs. He passed the sleeping couple, listening to the snores of the woman for a brief moment before continuing to the staircase. He made sure he was mostly silent as he traveled up the stairs, stopping every time he made the slightest noise. After what felt like a century, he met the top of the staircase, and found himself in a small hallway, in view of four doors, with only one being open with a light on. He walked over, pressing on the door to make the door open a bit more. 

Inside Clay was sat on a bed, his head in his hands, grabbing locks of his hair, and running his fingers through. The source of light was a small lamp in the corner, but it surprisingly illuminated a good portion of the room. Nick stepped in, cringing when the door creaked loudly, causing Clay's attention to be centered on him. He looked confused for a moment, but he seemed to get over it before he beckoned Nick over. Nick tiptoed into the room, choosing to stand a few feet away from his soulmate. His soulmate patted the space next to him on the bed obviously wanting Nick to sit. Nick gently sat on the edge of the bed, wary of how long he was meant to stay there. Clay just wrapped an arm around his waist and pulled him closer. He hadn't noticed it at first, but there was a song playing very faintly in the background, and Clay was humming along to the beat. Nick didn't recognize it, but he just sat in peace and let it happen. It took around two minutes for the song to taper off, and Clay stopped humming, now just sitting silently. It was very quiet, for a few minutes, the only sounds being their breathing and the muted sounds of wind blowing against his window. 

Clay was the first to speak, clearly not a huge fan of the empty noise. "Did it get cold out there?" Nick was confused for a moment, before he nodded sorrowfully. He wasn't very sad for long though, as he remembered the adventure with the bug. 

"There was a glowing bug in your yard!" Clay looked perplexed for a good second, before he looked at Nick like he was an idiot. Then he grabbed his phone next to him, typing in something on a website before showing him a picture. It was the exact same bug that. He nodded emphatically. 

"A firefly?" Now it was Nick's turn to look confused. He had no clue that that bug was a 'firefly'. Clay seemed to think for a second, before continuing, "you might know them as lighting bugs" Nick just shook his head. He had never heard of either of those terms. Either way, they were cool and he was happy to meet one. But Clay still looked very concerned about something. Nick gently nudged him, trying to prompt him to say something. "It's just- fireflies aren't usually out at this time of the year-" he smiled, "I guess that just means you are very lucky." Nick grinned at that, happy he was lucky in at least one thing in life. They sat in silence for a few more minutes, before Clay seemed to unhinge his jaw to give a wide yawn. 

"Are you sleepy?" Clay just nodded in response, rubbing his eyes. "Do you have a guest room I can go to?" Clay just shook his head in response to that, standing up. He prompted Nick to stand up as well, before he pulled the covers back on the bed. He then proceeded to wave his arm towards the bed as if he want Nick to get in. "Wait! No! I can go sleep somewhere else, I don't need to take your b-" Clay just pushed him onto the bed, before scooting him over towards the inside. Nick cocked his head at the motion, but remained laying down. Then Clay got into the bed, pulling the cover above himself and seemed to try to start going to sleep. It took a few minutes, for Nick to actually speak up, and it came out weak and timid. "Are you sure you are fine with me sleeping here?" Suddenly Clay flipped around and wrapped an arm around Nick's stiff form, as he began to mumble. 

"I'm not gonna let you-" he yawned, "get hurt again. So you sleep here." After that, he closed his eyes and resumed trying to fall asleep. Nick smiled at the sentiment and actually began to relax. The bed as admittedly incredibly soft, and it felt as if the pillows were trying to pull Nick into sleep. He felt himself relax completely, slowly growing very drowsy. The door creaked open and Nick cracked an eye open, seeing Clay's father peaking his head in. He seemed to be on the phone with someone, and he began to whisper as soon as he saw Nick's resting form. 

"He is asleep right now, did you want me to wake him up?" Some words came through the phone and he nodded. "Yep, get the suit, and bring him first thing in the morning, gotcha boss." Then he hung up the phone and walked out of the room, closing the door behind him. Without the interruption, Nick very quickly grew tired again, and was struggling to keep his eyes open. He looked out the window for a moment, thinking about the firefly, and remembered how lucky he was. He gave a small smile to noone but himself before he allowed his eyes to close and for him to fall asleep. 

* * *

The next morning he woke up to being shaken very softly. He could feel Clay's arm still slung over him, so it definitely wasn't him. He fully opened his eyes, and saw Clay's mother leaning over her son to shake him. Once she noticed he was awake she silently cheered, and then beckoned him towards her. Nick was used to waking up quickly, so he carefully peeled himself from his soulmate's grasp before crawling off the bed and to his mother. She smiled at him once he got to the ground, and began to walk to the door, obviously wanting Nick to follow. Once they got outside, she closed the door and began to speak. 

"Hey Nick, we have tons of stuff to do today, so I wanted to make sure that you were able to get ready for all of it" he pointed towards Clay's bedroom. She began to chuckle, "that kid can get ready in five minutes flat, I wanted you to take your time." She put a hand on his shoulder, shaking him softly. She pointed to one of the doors in the hallway. "That is the bathroom, go ahead and take a nice shower, there is some travel size soaps and hair stuff, and there is some clothes." She rubbed the back of her neck, "sorry if they are a bit big, I just ran to the store and grabbed some that were the size under Clay." He was quick to shake his head at her.

"You've already done more than I could ever pay you back for, I can handle some loose clothes." She looked relieved at that, but then just gently pushed him in the direction of the bathroom before she walked into another door in the hallway. Nick followed her push finding himself in a semi-small bathroom, the walls painted a mint green. He closed and locked the door behind him before he got any further in observing. He looked at the counter, and found what Clay's mother had said there was. A fluffy towel stacked on top of what looked to be a full set of clothes. On top of the towel was an unopened toothbrush accompanied by a small toothpaste and 3 oz mouthwash, along with mini set of shower supplies; shampoo, conditioner, body wash, and even a small loofah. A clean comb was sitting next to the stack of items, and a stick of unopened deodorant was knocked over next to that. That seemed to complete the set of things left for him. Other than that, there was a cup with a toothbrush already in it and a mint toothpaste next to that, and a large thing of mouthwash. He looked up at the mirror, and grimaced when he saw himself. He looked pretty bad to be honest with himself. He looked unnaturally thin, and his hair was everywhere, but he wasn't that nasty, after all the nurses gave him a nice cleaning before he had left. He walked over the shower, gently pulling the handle towards him and turning on the water. It came out pretty quickly, and it was warm within a few seconds. He grabbed all of the shower stuff and set it on the edge of the bathtub before he quickly stripped his clothes off, and hopped in. He closed his eyes from the warmth the shower was giving off. It had been a very large amount of time before he had last had a warm shower, and he was going to make every second of it. He took a moment to pop open the cap of the shampoo, soaking his hair while he did so. He poured a quarter sized amount in his hand, and then rubbed it all over his scalp, making sure he lathered every inch of his hair. He washed that off fairly quickly, before he did the same thing with the conditioner, but he left that it, choosing to bathe himself while he let the conditioner set. His uncle who was a barber shop owner had told him that was the way to do it when he was very young, and he had never forgotten that. He then grabbed the loofah, and squirted a large amount of body wash on it. He rubbed it until the loofah was covered in suds, and then proceeded to scrub himself clean, making sure he cleaned even the backs of his ears and the bottoms of his feet. He rung the loofah out, and set it back on the edge of the bathtub before he rinsed the conditioner out, feeling the water cover his scalp made him smile, very happy that he was able to do his. He let the water wash over him for a few more minutes, before he turned off the water and grabbed the towel off the counter. He patted himself down, making sure not one part of him was wet, before he proceeded to slip into the clothes that were provided for him. They were obviously new, and a very soft material as it hardly felt like he was wearing anything. It was true that it was a bit flowy on him, but only in the torso region, as it actually fit quite nicely on his shoulders. The pants were a good fit, but they were a bit big on his ankles. He slathered on some deodorant sniffing himself multiple times to make sure he was not going to smell bad, before he opened up the toothbrush package. It was obviously a nice toothbrush, the way that the bristles bent under his finger, but he didn't take too long thinking about it. He instead put some of the small toothpaste on the brush and brushed his teeth down until when he ran his tongue over them he couldn't feel anything disgusting on them. He took a small swig of mouthwash, before looking at himself in the mirror and combing his hair. That only took him a couple minutes, before he felt he was done. He opened the drawer under the sink, and found it be empty, so he put all of the stuff he had been given in there, hoping that he'd be able use it again at some point. He picked up all his dirty clothes and towel he used and stepped out of the bathroom. Clay's mother was walking past when he did, and smiled at him, before grabbing all the dirty laundry from his hands and going downstairs. He wasn't able to go anywhere after that, because Clay's father walked by right after, pulling him close to him as he walked down the stairs. 

"You, son, are going to get a suit today!" He looked way to happy about the fact that Nick was getting a suit, but it was soon clarified why, "I, work at the shop, I design the suits-" he waved his hand around, "and I can already see you wearing this gorgeous navy blue, same color tie, and-" he jumped off the last stair, "a striped shirt underneath- yes!" he walked away after that, still talking about suits. Clay's mother walked by him, smiling at him, before turning her gaze to Nick.

"Don't worry about him, he really is a good designer, he is just is a little too excited about those things." She chuckled for a moment. "You can go watch TV or go grab a snack, I am going to go wake up my son and then we can leave."

Nick nodded and walked over to where he though he saw a pantry. He opened the door and cheered when he found out he was right, and just grabbed a granola bar before sitting down on the couch and watching whatever was on. It couldn't have taken more than four minutes for Clay and his mother to come down the stairs, the former looking like he was about to murder the latter. He didn't get to say anything, because Clay's father busted back into the room, carrying a pair of keys and a huge smile. "Off we go!"

Nick stood up and followed the family out of the home, taking a second to look at the scenery he didn't see the first time. It felt like as soon as he was sitting in the car, he was getting out. 

The day seemed to fly by after that. He felt barely there when he got a suit, and was hardly paying attention when he walked into the hotel and was bid farewell. He hugged Clay tightly, before he was pulled in by the police officer and talked to about the day. All he could hear was court. Court, court, court. The officer just kept going. They had to meet someone in court, the parents needed to go to court, his aunt needed to go to court, he needed to go to court. After the police officer ran over the day, Nick just sat on the stiff couch and stared at the ceiling.

He felt it was all setting in now, all the things that were needed. The officer said that it would be a clean and cut case in his opinion, and he shouldn't worry about it. He didn't want to take the officer's word for it though. It felt like he got to relax for just a minute before the officer was pulling him out of the hotel and to a car. He didn't even ask where they were going, he already knew. Court. He had never been to a courthouse for anything, and the fact that they were going to a courthouse for someone else to determine where he would be happiest disturbed him greatly. He could feel the anxiety about to burst through his chest, and he was not very happy about it. He stood outside the giant doors now. He wasn't sure if he was ready. He felt confident in the suit, at least. 

* * *

It lasted hours and hours. People talking about him as if he was an object to be passed around. He wasn't really able to say anything however. He started to stop paying attention towards the end. Suddenly, the noise tapered down, and that drew his attention. The judge was looking at Clay's parents and his own aunt. He shuffled around some papers, he looked exhausted. Finally he just cleared his throat and began to speak.

"In the case of Nicholas, the opposition's claims were unsubstantiated, and custody will remain in the hands of the soulmate's guardians, unless another plea is brought forward by the opposition. Case closed."

He just sat there with his mouth open. He looked at Clay's parents. They were smiling. He saw Clay in the corner of his eye in the crowd. He was smiling. Then he was smiling too. Everyone was smiling. Clay's parents stood up in sync, both looking at Nick. Then Nick just jumped into their arms and knew that he was no longer going to be in pain, because he was going to be with them. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the next chapter is the last, but on that note, i know i have put all my readers through a lot, so thank all of you who have lasted this long :D 
> 
> i must say one does not have to read this chapter in order to read the next one, as it is mainly just filler. boring i know, but i wanted to get that cuddle scene in there. 
> 
> just for clarification if anyone is concerned, at this point in the work they are BOTH minors, if anything is suggested, i promise i didn't mean it like that.


	16. so here we are

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> it was now that he saw the reality of it all

The rest of the day that included the court case was filled with good food, movies, and sleeping. Nick found himself in the same exact position as the day before; a movie playing in the background while he laid on Clay's shoulder. The parents were not asleep, but he could sense that they looked very close to it. He could feel the allure of sleep, even though it could not be any later than 5 in the afternoon at this point. He was just so warm, he felt as if he was melting away into the couch. Clay wasn't exactly making it easier to stay awake either. He was rhythmically rubbing his arm, and the pounding of his heart made him oddly calm. He couldn't help himself when a huge yawn make him crack open his jaw and his eyes roll back. Clay just looked at him lazily, before mumbling something along the lines of "just go to sleep" his words were slurred from his own obvious fatigue, but Nick trusted him, and allowed himself to put his full dead weight on his partner, falling asleep in what felt like less than a minute. 

He woke up the sound of sizzling and the smell of something cooking. He was still leaning against Clay, but the other was now asleep, so Nick didn't bother to move. The movie was paused on the credits, reading off the main actors' names. He noticed how Clay's parents were no longer on couch, and took an educated guess that they were the ones who were making food. He began to fade out again, feeling his eyelids fall on their own accord. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Clay's mother take a photo of him and Clay, before she just walked back to what Nick assumed was the kitchen. Nick yawned once more, before allowing himself to relax completely.

This time when he woke up, it was because he was being shaken. He opened his eyes slowly, trying to blink away the inklings of sleep that were plaguing his brain. Clay's father stopped shaking him once he realized Nick was awake, before he mentioned something about dinner and walked off. Nick was somehow still incredibly tired, but he pushed through it in order to follow the sound of talking and the smell of food. He went under an archway, and found himself looking at the entire family. Clay looked just as well off as himself, with drooping eyelids and slow movements, while his parent's looked much more awake. His mother waved at him, to which he ended just yawning in response. She chuckled at that but didn't actually say anything. 

Maybe it was just a moment, where he remembered his past. He froze in the dining room, staring at all of the warm food, and he panicked. He wasn't allowed to have food like that, because he wasn't good enough for that. He could see the looks of the others become perplexed, but he wasn't really paying attention to that. He stood still for just a second more. He wasn't sure what took over him, but he bolted. Straight out of the dining room and through the dining room. He raced up the stairs, even tripping on the top one and almost falling. He rushed into the room he remembered to be Clay's and busted in, breathing heavily and in mass panic. He couldn't find somewhere to sit in the corner. His parents made him sit in a corner, and there was no open corner. He could feel his face becoming entirely too hot, and he felt like he could collapse at any moment. He climbed onto the bed, shaking like a leaf, and weeping. He curled up as hard as he could on the corner of the bed, hoping that it would still meet the requirements. He was in the corner, but he couldn't sit in the corner. He heard footsteps approaching, he began to panic more. He had done something wrong, and he was going to be punished for it. That just made him cry harder. He had been so happy, and now he was paying that back. He heard the door creak open, but didn't dare peak his head out. If he looked they got upset, and he got hurt more if he upset them. He was clutching the sheets under himself in a death grip, ready to accept the fate he had made for himself by even thinking he deserved food. He just started to mumble out apologies, knowing that they didn't mean anything to them. He felt the bed dip beside him, he managed to curl in on himself just a little more, protecting his tummy and head. He could feel the cover being peeled back, and he now began to apologize louder. The cover was fully peeled off, but he didn't move at all, maybe if he just remained still they would think he was dead and not bother him. He felt a hand on his back and flinched so hard that he hit his head against the wall with a lot of force, causing him to be whimper from the pain. At the same time he hit his head, the hand removed itself from his back and Nick was sure it was rearing back now, ready to beat the life out of him. He heard an audible groan from someone, before the pressure on the bed lifted and he head some footsteps, He heard another noise in the corner of the room, before it all became silent again. He was sure his parents wouldn't just give up an opportunity to beat him, so he began to question if maybe they had changed a bit. Maybe they were better people now. He opened one of his eyes, allowing himself to adjust to the light again. In the corner sat Clay, rubbing the top of his head with a sad look on his face. Nick felt himself relax a bit, Clay said that he wouldn't let anyone get to him, so maybe he would stop his parents. He slowly uncurled himself from his ball, making sure to make slow, small movements. Clay just sat there patiently. As soon he felt he could, he shot into a sitting position, looking at Clay.

"Can I come over there please?" Nick just feverishly shook his head. Clay looked at bit disappointed at that, but made no attempts to come any closer. They sat in silence for a couple minutes, with just the sounds of Nick's shaky breaths and Clay's occasional sigh. "Try to breath hun..." Nick just looked at the other, but did as he was instructed, trying to take deep breaths. He saw Clay press his hand on his chest. "Your heart is going really fast, is there anything that calms you down?" Nick shook his head, but did not say anything. 

One breath in and one breath out. One breath in and one breath out, over and over again. He could feel the fogginess leave his skull, and his head stopped racing so much. 

"Can I come over there Nick?" He heard footsteps coming up the stairs, he was starting to panic again. He began to curl into a ball, but kept his eyes on Clay. He stood up slowly, displaying both hands like he was approaching a rabid dog. He took one step at a time, until he stood next to his bed, turning to sit on the edge. He then pointed to the door, "Anybody who comes through the door has to come through me before they even see you over there." Nick analyzed the room, discovering that was true. He was pressed against the corner, making it so a person would have to deliberately be looking for him to find him. "The person coming up the stairs-" Nick entire body froze, he was terrified of who it was, and he wasn't really sure if knowing would make it any better, "the person coming up is my dad. He walks up stairs really fast, but walks really slow." Nick just stared between him and the door. "He was born in Michigan, but he moved here when he was 18 since he already found mom when he went to Disney when he was 15." Nick began to become interested in the story. Clay chuckled, "Yeah he left his entire family behind to join her, and said he never regretted it. I never met my grandparent's on my dad's side, they didn't really support his career choice." A frown grew on Clay's face, but he shook his head, seeming to forget that entirely. "He said he had pet cat when he was younger." Clay didn't elaborate after that, and Nick realized he was done speaking. 

He swallowed hard, barely croaking out what he wanted. "What was the cat's name?" He could see Clay grin. 

"He said he call the cat Smoky, but his little sister technically named him Mittens." Nick giggled at that. He could imagine the man he had met before being so stubborn that he calls a cat a whole new name. Clay continued, "and my mom, she said she had this fish tank when she was younger. She said that it had a fish for every color of the rainbow, and that she named them all the wrong colors." Nick let out a huge smile at that. It sounded exactly like Clay's mother now. Clay looked him in the eye and he lightly flinched. "Can I come a bit closer?" Nick debated it in his head, before nodding slowly. Clay crept his way up to the top of the bed, so now the two were separated by a couple feet of space. There was silence again and it make Nick's anxiety rise. Suddenly Clay started to talk again, "Oh! When I was a kid, couldn't have been more than five or six I had this pet hamster." He giggled, "his name was Hampton." Now that was funny to Nick, he laughed so hard he had to uncurl himself. He saw Clay give a huge smile. "Can I sit next to you?" Nick pondered it, looking at the space between them, before he scooted himself a little closer to his soulmate. His soulmate in response held out a hand to him. Nick cocked his head, and Clay slowly moved to interlock their fingers, rubbing the back of Nick's hand. 

The silence was more welcoming now, and Nick felt a little more comfortable. Clay began to talk again, "when I was younger, I was convinced that in order to get things to be blue, you had to dip them in the sky somehow-" he wheezed at his own stupidity, "so anytime my parents got me a blue shirt, I would feel like the most special person on earth." Nick smiled at how cute that was. "And! Around the same age, I thought hedgehogs were just hamsters with quills glued on, so I was scared of someone gluing quills to Hampton and make him a hedgehog." Nick found it peaceful the way that Clay talked, it was consistent and smooth. He could feel his heartrate slow down in his chest. He chose to scoot a little closer to Clay, to where their legs were touching. Clay slowly wrapped his arm around his shoulders. He began to hum something, but Nick didn't listen to music, so he wasn't really sure what it way. 

They sat like that for a while, humming and just being in each other's company. Nick could see the light outside fading to the night sky. After a while, Nick softly mumbled out an "I'm sorry." He could feel Clay shaking his head. 

"I don't need an apology, it wasn't your fault." Nick could argue that it was, but he just chose to relax his body and listen to what he said. "Pandas?" Nick looked at Clay expectantly. "I don't know how this-" he waved a hand between them "will work. But I am going to make sure that it works, even if it the last thing I do." 

Nick just smiled and leaned into Clay's body. Even if he wouldn't say it back, he was sure he could promise the same. They would make it work, even if it took a lifetime, so at least they could spend a lifetime together. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> welcome to the end of this work, i hope you enjoyed your stay :D i wanted to go ahead and express all my gratitude for those who read, commented, left kudos, or anything of the sort, as it really does mean a lot to me. i hope you all have a great day, week, year, decade, and much much more. 
> 
> (i'll admit it, i was going to end this story very angsty, but a person chose the number 3, and it made me change my mind)  
> ((also this was the worst ending ever?? but i like completely forget what epic ending i was supposed to write so sue me))
> 
> if you are truly interested, i will be starting to write a mafia au soon, so if you want to, you can stick around and wait for that :)
> 
> buh bye!

**Author's Note:**

> this is going to be awful, because this concept came to me in a dream, and I just wrote it before it fell from my smooth brain.  
> if you should want to follow me on twitter: @surelynotcrazy


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